Arrow of the Fallen
by antrea
Summary: Best friends, worst enemies, new prophecy, greatest road trip of all time. God blood is questioned, oaths are taken, strange creatures awake. Now fifteen years old, Nico tells it like it is. NicoXOC, some language but not used excessivey.
1. Molotov Cocktails

**A/N: Hey, this is my first story on fanfiction . net, so be nice! It follows Nico di Angelo and a new generation of half-bloods a few years after the canon arc. Nico is fifteen.**

Arrow of the Fallen - Chapter One: Molotov Cocktails

_The greater difficulty, the more glory in surmounting it. Skillful pilots gain their reputation from storms and tempests._

~Epicures

_

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_

"You sure you can't come to the beach with us?" Reese whined, playing with my hair.

I looked at her. It was a shame I couldn't go to a trip like this, but Percy had _insisted_ – "Nico you better come back to Camp Half-Blood once that last bell rings or I will personally hunt you down okay you better come fast I need you alright 'cuz there's a lot of problems around here NICO" – that I couldn't go anywhere but back to camp. Pretty freakin' sad.

"Sorry, Ree, but my brother's forcing me to pick strawberries with him."

"Dude, Percy's beast and all, but picking _strawberries?_" my other friend Logan said incredulously.

"He has a thing for his strawberries," I shrugged.

They all gave me weird looks.

"You know what?" Tay exclaimed. "Give me your phone."

"What?"

"Give me your phone!" She wrestled it out of my grip, her blonde hair flipping annoyingly into my face.

"Watch it!" I snarled. "What're you doing?"

She had the phone at her ear already. "Hello? Hi, this is Taylor Bridgeman, Nico's friend, and I was wondering if you could allow Nico to come to a beach party with us? I mean, all the freshmen will be there and it _is _like _the _party of the _year. _And sorry, Perce, but picking strawberries is lame."

"Dammit," I hissed, knowing the whole camp would ridicule me if they heard I used the "picking strawberries" excuse again.

"Please can Nico go?"

I could imagine Percy grimacing on the other end and knew it was a lost cause.

"He said no," Tay sighed, hanging up and surfing my iPhone apps. "Anyone up for a game of TapTap?"

"I'll play!" Logan grinned.

I rolled my eyes at Reese and signed all the yearbooks that had accumulated on my desk while I was listening to Tay talk to my 'brother.' After the war, Percy's mom, Sally, offered to take me in as my legal guardian and despite my protests, she did. Percy became my brother and Paul became my other legal guardian, but thankfully I kept the di Angelo as my last name. Shortly after that, they enrolled me in this school, and I met my first actual friends.

Reese Prospero keeps us down to earth, has a quirky personality, and wants to be a fashion designer when she grows up. Tay is a lot more girly, hyper, and spontaneous; her carefree, daring ways get us into a lot of trouble. Logan King's main hobbies are eating, gaming, and skateboarding, like me. We are eerily alike, and that's what makes us the best of friends. The last guy in our group, Lance Smith was already away on vacation, the lucky butt. He can make a joke out of everything, which keeps our group laughing like crazy.

"Whoa, what is that?" Reese asked in a stupefied tone of voice.

"What is what?"

"That!"

There was an explosion outside the window. A redhead girl wearing a trenchcoat and some pretty high boots was carrying a bulging Wal-Mart bag and backed up against the side of a townhouse, surrounded in smoke and fire and something moving in the midst of it all. While I watched, she drew out a medium sized bottle from the plastic bag, lit it on fire with a cigarette lighter held between her teeth, and threw it into the inferno.

"Dude, that is so badass," Logan breathed beside me. "Molotov cocktails!"

I was already out of my chair and squinting hard at the raging fire. A clawed arm whipped out from the smoke and knocked the girl down.

It could only be a Greek monster.

I snatched my phone from Tay's hand and ran out of the classroom, heart racing.

"Nico! Where are you going?" Reese yelled after me.

"Bathroom! Severe wave of diarrhea coming on!" I shouted without looking back.

"You're lying!" Reese screamed.

"Don't come after me!"

"You're _dead, _di Angelo!"

Yup, Reese was so mad at me.

I ran past hallways of lockers and then finally out the south entrance of our high school, the closest to Madapple Road, where the monster attack was happening. The police hadn't gathered, what with all the Mist around, but with that girl throwing Molotov cocktails aimlessly around, at least the fire brigade would come any minute now.

"Hey, what are you doing?" I screamed at the girl.

The girl whirled around in shock, an already aflame cocktail in her hand. "Who the _hell_ are _you?_" she growled, turning from me to throw the cocktail into the monster again.

I was now close enough to her to see her face. She seemed about my age and she could only be a demigod, giving that she could see through the Mist. She could also be like Sally, but monsters were only attracted to half-bloods, and not mortals with a sharper eye. Her eyes right now were narrowed at me with distrust but really her pupils seemed diluted with shock, or fear.

"Shit, man, get out of here!" she warned.

"I should be telling you the same thing," I said sarcastically, jammed my hand into my pocket and took out a cigarette lighter, not unlike the one she was holding in her left hand.

"What are you _doing_, smoking at a time like this?" she screeched as the monster crashed into view.

It was gruesome and terrifying giant, bleeding blue green blood from burn wounds – so the Molotov cocktails did work, a little. The monster stood five stories high. It saw the two of us and roared monster obscenities then opened its mouth incredibly wide and red orange fire shot out of its jaws in gushing jets.

I laughed. "Fighting fire with fire, aren't you?" I smirked at the girl. "It was a good idea to throw one of those cocktails into his eyes. I approve." The monster was blinded so his fire hardly reached us.

"You can see him?" the girl gasped incredulously.

Without an answer, I flipped the top of my black cigarette lighter and my Stygian iron sword extended into its three feet of badass.

"Mother," the girl breathed.

"Go take cover. I'll take care of this!" I yelled back at her.

Then I rammed my sword into the ground. "I am Nico, son of Hades! I summon souls of those who will fight even during death!"

Six skeletons leapt up from the crack I made in the ground. The monster was way too big for just me to take on. The skeletons ran towards the giant, slashing Stygian daggers and shooting celestial bronze bullets into its legs and arms.

"RAUGHHHHHHH!" the giant howled, collapsing onto the ground. It breathed a huge stream of fire that killed off four of the skeletons and I winced. This had to end now.

I took a running start and ran up the side of a Dumpster, bent my knees, and projected myself thirty feet in the air, not as tall as the giant but it was enough. Through the air, I sliced through the giant with both hands on my sword for extra power. The monster shrieked in an eerie tone and disintegrated into dust and I landed with a roll on the ground to protect my back. The cement still jarred me and I suppressed the urge to cry out.

The remaining two skeletons bowed to me before disappearing into the ground, back to the Underworld. I lay there, panting hard, and the red-head girl ran over, hands at her mouth.

"You could have _died_!" she said. "You could have died! What were you thinking?"

"I'm trained to kill monsters," I explained, digging around in my pockets for an emergency supply of ambrosia. "You're hurt."

A gash the size of Texas ran down her back and arm, the trenchcoat torn open. "It's nothing," the girl said.

I broke off a tiny piece of ambrosia and gave it to her. "Eat up – don't argue."

She glared at me but ate it and her face relaxed. "What is this stuff? It tastes like the best brownie I've ever had in my life!"

I grinned, eating my own piece even smaller than hers to regenerate energy from summoning the skeletons. "This is ambrosia, the food of the gods. It can't be consumed by regular mortals or they'll die."

"Then what am I?" asked the girl, horrified.

"You're like me. You're the child of one mortal parent, and one parent who is a Greek god or goddess. Awfully powerful god parent too, with that mother of all monsters," I said, gazing at the place it once stood.

"I'm pretty sure it was a 'father' of all monsters."

I looked at her thoughtfully. "True dat."

"You know I don't really believe you?" she said softly. "Greek gods don't exist. Any kinds of gods don't exist. I learned about Zeus and all that in fourth grade, I think they're all kind of silly."

Thunder pounded loudly overhead. "Don't insult Zeus, please," I told her. "And you have to believe me. I have to take you to Camp Half-Blood, and our leader Chiron will tell you all about your new life."

"I don't want to have a new life! I like my life here!"

"I'm a son of Hades and I still live in Manhattan. Are you going to spend the rest of your life throwing Molotov cocktails at monsters that aren't even that affected by them? You were pretty banged up today; if I didn't have ambrosia with me you'd have a massive infection with demon-fire and the hospitals here won't even know how to fix you up. You'll die. If you come to camp, you'll learn how to defend yourself, and get medical supplies for the real life."

"You're a bastard," she told me.

"I'm a bastard that saved your ungrateful little life. And, hey, you still haven't told me your name."

"It's Cres. Cres Fallen."

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**Please review! Next chapter is at camp! And if you're wondering what the monster was, its name is Kakos, or Cacus. It's an Italian fire-breathing giant originally defeated by Hercules.**


	2. The Gorge

**A/N: The beginning's kind of slow. Sorry. Oh, and here's a disclaimer:**

**Any character that you recognize belongs to Rick Riordan and all other copyright holders. There's also some Harry Potter (copyright J.K. Rowling) references in this chapter, which I also do not own. I am not (sadly) making any profit from this. **

Arrow of the Fallen - Chapter Two: The Gorge

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Later on, I had to grab my stuff from my locker.

I crept back into the school about the time fourth period started so there was no one in the hallways which meant Reese couldn't find me or kill me at my locker. Cres waited impatiently as I cleaned my locker out, and it took a while. There was this huge pile of crumpled worksheets, notes, and love letters (no kidding), gum, cookies, chips, candy wrappers, and dirt, caked up at the bottom of the locker. The whole thing smelled like a wet sponge in a boy's locker room.

"Oh, that reminds me," I said to Cres. "Do you want to get anything from your house to bring to camp?"

She raised an eyebrow. "What, they're not sent to camp automatically?"

"This ain't Hogwarts, muggle."

"Then I wish I was a wizard, then."

"Don't we all," I said pointedly towards my locker. I was pretty sure there were some papers that I needed to save were in all that mess, but gum was sticking every single paper together in some way. It was long going.

"And besides," she said, "my mom will freak if I tell her about this camp. She's really protective of me and won't let me go anywhere. That's why I sneak out all the time."

I looked back to her.

She had the signature half-blood look on: annoyed at the world and a little sad at the same time. Her red hair was pulled into a messy bun and random locks curled around her face. She had taken off her black trenchcoat – no wonder since it was summer, hello – and underneath she was wearing a grey button up tanktop tunic with fishnet tights and knee high combat boots.

"Hey, Nico, what if I told you that I know who my father is?" she said carefully.

"You would be lying." I replied flatly, stuffing random junk into my bag.

"No," she frowned, "my dad's still alive. I know for sure he's my father. I'll bet you a million dollars that if I went into DNA testing right now, he'll be the perfect match."

"I really want to believe you, but you're obviously a half-blood, Fallen. Though that does bring up a good point – how old are you?"

"How _old_ am I?"

"Weird question, I know," I said.

"I'm fifteen."

"Huh." I was afraid to tell her that it was basically illegal for gods to not claim their children. Chiron could tell her that.

I slammed the locker shut and locked the lock for the last time until the coming September and waved Cres over. "This way," and we walked out to the main entrance which had a pick-up point.

The sky was partly cloudy; the sun tugging the clouds apart at random areas. Cars honked, cats shrieked, pots and pans banged, doors slammed, and cell phones rang in New York City's signature soundtrack. My school, Wyldson School of Arts and Technology, shared an eight story building called Wyldson Place with a music studio and a realtor agency. The school occupied floors one to six, the music studio on floor seven, and the realtor agency on floor eight. We also had the roof top of Wyldson Place for science activities and a field behind the building for P.E. The main entrance to Wyldson Place was on a secluded little road that was never visited by that many taxis. So, endearingly, I dug out my phone ready to call the taxi hotline.

"Are you calling a taxi?" said Cres.

"Yeah, why?"

"Hang up. I have a better ride," she told me. She dug out her own phone, a HTC Touch, and dialed a number from her contacts.

Almost immediately, a black limousine pulled up into the driveway.

"Fallen, what the hell is that?"

The limo slicked up to the road and stopped where we were standing. A dude in a white chauffeur uniform jumped out from the driver's seat while the passenger door slid open automatically. "Miss Fallen, where to?"

I gaped at him, and then gaped at Cres. "Uh . . ."

"Nico, snap to it! Where are we going?"

"Uh . . . right . . . Long Island – OW!"

Cres shoved me into the limousine.

It was even cooler inside the limo than outside the limo. The black leather seats were arranged around a small coffee table and colorful throws were thrown about everywhere. The purple carpet underfoot was plush and furry, and a large, modern looking refrigerator stood in the corner. Alternative rock music was playing from the radio and AXN flickered onto a large flat screen TV. I was pretty sure there was WiFi too. Cres settled into one of the lounges and pressed a button on the ceiling that brought up a thick back pane of plastic separating the driver's seat with the main room. Another button set the windows dimmer than regular shades and a third button readjusted the room's light to a glow of multicolor, mimicking lava lamps. She flung her trench coat onto a coat hook and reached into the fridge.

"Root beer?" Cres offered, pulling the tab of her own can.

"Sure," I said. "So, what's the deal, Fallen? Are you like the United States president?"

"Of course I am," Cres said. "No, Nico, duh."

"I thought so, I never see you on TV."

"Shut up. My mom's really famous and rich, ok? She can afford to have limo escorts and stuff. She's a celebrity."

"Well, who _is_ she?"

She slammed her root beer onto the table and glared at me. "My mom spent all her life keeping me secret from the paparazzi. I've only known you for, what, an hour? I don't trust you, Nico di Angelo, so you can stop with all the questions."

I was really taken aback. Cres did not seem the kind of girl who would lash out at people for the sake of her mother. And now I was way too curious who her mom was. She didn't look like any celebrity I knew, though she did have much the same hair like Mitchell Fallen – wait, Mitchell _Fallen,_ the star of all those movies?

"Mitchell Fallen!" I blurted, and Cres squeaked.

"_WHAT?"_ she yelped, leaping up and banging her head on the roof of the limo. _"OW!"_

"Your dad is _Mitchell Fallen?"_

"No, he's not!" Cres yelled, which totally gave it away.

"But then who's your mom?"

She downed all her root beer and opened up another can, and didn't speak at me for the rest of the drive only to say, "This Camp Half-Blood better not be full of all the outrageous crap you're spewing."

"di Angelo, we're in Long Island now. So where exactly is this place?"

"Huh?" I said dumbly, looking up from the TV. The limo was stocked with the best video games, and incredibly recent ones like COD 6, a game I wanted to get ever since it came out a few days ago. Call of Duty had to be one of the best games ever invented, but I preferred the World War II stuff better than Modern Warfare.

I stuck my head out the window and gasped. "Tell the limo driver dude to turn right! Like right now!"

"Thanks for the warning, di Angelo!" She tore a black thing from the ceiling and spoke into it, "Hey, Drew, turn right! Right!"

The limo swerved as it attempted to turn right onto the dusty road outside and I lost my balance and crashed into Cres. She was sort of standing up so she lost her balance too and we fell onto the black plastic divider thing separating the limo driver – Drew – from us.

"God, di Angelo, way to suffocate me!" Cres groaned and sort of collapsed onto the floor of the limo.

"No problem," I scowled, rubbing my elbow which had somehow jabbed her head in the losing balance process. "Your head is –"

"_WHAT?"_

"– is nice. Your head is nice. Will you stop glaring at me like I'm a constipated hippo who stole your baby chicks?"

She didn't say anything and I wanted to scream. But that would kind of be a girly move. Who did she think she was? Some ruler of the universe? Her father may be Mitchell Fallen and her mother may be as popular as him, but that didn't mean you could shove everyone you saw around. Gods.

I was about to launch into an angry rant about her stupid little attitude, when I noticed the strawberry fields and the green hill leading into camp. "Oh, look. We're here."

We got out of the limo, and Cres waved Drew off. "We're fine, Drew, and _don't _tell Mom, 'kay? It's a summer camp that I get to be like a normal kid for a while. So no calling of the police, Drew, tell all that to Mom."

"Yes, ma'am."

"It's just up here," I told Cres after the limousine was gone. I led her up the grassy hill and once up on top, I was immediately reminded of home. The Greek buildings were spread out throughout the valley: the Big House, the dining hall, the amphitheatre, and the cabins, which looked like small dots. You could even see the fighting arenas and the Poop Pile from atop the hill.

After I took it all in, I turned back to Cres, who was staring in horror at something.

"HOMIGOD," Cres moaned. "Is that a dragon I see before me?"

"Did you really go all 17th century on me?"

"I hate your stupid literalism," she said, slowly backing away from Peleus, the dragon that guarded the Golden Fleece.

"Come on, it's just a dragon. Haven't you seen worse?"

"But it's like tame and all!"

"Is that what you're so amazed at?" I tugged at her shoulder and we walked down the path to the Big House.

When we got to the bottom of the hill, Chiron was teaching a bunch of campers an outdoor history lesson on Thalia and her tree. He was in full horsey form and looked up when we approached. His face was all surprise when he asked, "Who's this?"

"This," I said, pointing, "is Crescent Fallen. Who likes to be called Cres. She's undetermined."

"Undetermined?" Chiron asked in a confused tone of voice.

"She's fifteen," I whispered at him.

Cres was staring at us like we were crazy. "Is my age so important to you guys? And are you really a centaur?"

"Crescent – Cres – this way. You need to see the orientation video first." Chiron gave me a look before leading Cres away to the Big House. "Nico, we're playing Capture the Flag later on this evening, and Percy wants to see you. He's teaching a sword fighting class in Arena One."

"Capture the Flag?" I winced. Camp Half-Blood's Capture the Flag somehow never turned out like it did in normal mortal's games. The last time I played it, my friend James, a son of Aeolus, the wind god, nearly speared open my head and he was on the same team as me. It turned out that his twin Roxy had somehow taken control of James's own powers but suddenly lost control and the spear rammed into my head from sheer force of the wind. I was wearing a helmet but the helmet dented and cracked, giving me a huge gash near my forehead –

Anyway.

Arena One was overfilled with six year old kids running around. It seemed like they were practicing thrusts, but only the boys were and the girls were hiding away, giggling. Everyone looked up when I came into the Arena and they all started pelting towards me.

Oh, gods, this was going to hurt.

"NICO! NICO! NICO! YAY!" they screeched and I was knocked down by all fifteen of them barreling into me.

"Ow, guys, come on, you've grown a lot since last year," I laughed as they all hugged some part of my body.

"Guys, guys, get off from my brother," Percy said, amusement twinkling in his sea green eyes.

Tall and smug looking, my adoptive brother slunk into view. He was wearing an orange camp shirt with the word "Counselor" emblazoned across the back and carrying a wooden sword. "Didn't think you would get out of school this early, Nic."

"Um, yeah, I kind of recruited a new half-blood."

He raised an eyebrow.

"I mean, she's not really like a half-blood. I don't know who she is. It's kind of weird. But she's gets mad at me a lot. So I don't really care _what_ she is. I'll own her in Capture the Flag tonight. Such as butthead."

His other eyebrow raised.

"Ok, Perce, did you really want to drag me all the way to camp just to remain silent and raise those eyebrows theatrically?" I ask, annoyed.

"Right," he said. "Dylan, Dylan, c'mon, you'll get to see Nico later." He waved away my biggest fan and then turned to me. "Let's go."

I followed him down to the cabins, but he didn't stop there.

"Where are we going?" I complained.

"Just around the cabins. There's something I want you to see that no one knows about except for me, Chiron, and Grover."

"Grover?"

"You'll see."

The opposite bank of the cabins was mostly just forest and secluded forest, at that. Percy walked up a small hill and said to me, "Down here."

"Oh my gods," I gasped in horror. "What _is _that?"

A gorge the size of a canyon cracked its way between trees and shrubbery. I closer – it spanned nearly eight feet from edge to edge and looked in. There was no telling how far down it went. It reminded me of that silly apocalyptical movie, 2012, but for some reason, the gorge looked more sinister than any of the cracks in the film. It was just yawning blackness inside.

"It starts from here and goes all the way to Long Island Sound," Percy explained. "That means water gets into the crack, but I don't know where it goes, because you can never see the water level. It's a bit like Tatarus. I've thrown rocks into it and they don't make a noise when they hit the bottom. If there _is_ a bottom.

"Grover and I have been having the same nightmares about this crack that skeletons will leap out from it and drag us in. So we both guessed it opens to the Underworld, but Chiron isn't so sure. He says it doesn't smell of the Underworld."

"It doesn't," I said, looking down at the crack. "Did you recognize the skeletons? What were they wearing?"

"Only necklaces with pendants of eyes on the chains," said Percy with a shiver. "They blinked if you looked at them too hard."

I've heard of naked skeletons, skeletons that were into goth clothes, skeletons dressed in uniform, even the skeletons in camo that chased Percy and the others one summer, but I've never heard of eye necklaces that _blinked._ It creeped me out, and I'm the freakin' son of a god of death. The whole gorge creeped me out. Which was the deciding factor that this gorge was not from Hades. I knew it.

"I'll close it," I said. "It's definitely not from the Underworld, but I have control over all land."

"I was hoping you would say that," Percy said with relief, and stepped back.

I bent down and shut my eyes in concentration. To close a crack this big, it would take a lot of effort. I would have to close one section at a time, so I started from the beginning.

"I'm the son of Hades," I whispered. "You will act on my command." Talking to inanimate objects was just part of being a half-blood. I concentrated on the tug of the earth and the spirits of millions of dead people helping me along.

Sucking it all in, I slapped the ground, my left hand on one side of the crack, my right on the other.

But why wasn't anything happening? I mentally tugged harder, my knuckles turning white from the pressure I was putting on the ground. _"Cleiste, cleiste, sas diatazo ston peribolo!"_ the Greek poured out of my , close, I command you to close!

The earth still stayed stubborn beneath my fingers; even when I used the power of soul after soul extracted from the Underworld, the crevasse was still irritatingly gaping. "I can't do it," I panted. "There's something wrong with this earth. It could be like space rock or something!"

Percy opened his mouth to say something, then his eyes widened in shock. "NICO! GET BACK FROM THE CRACK!"

"What?"

He knocked into me and we went sprawling away from the gorge.

"What the hell was that about?"

But he wasn't looking at me, or apologizing. He was staring openly at what was coming out of the ground.

With the sound of a giant wave crashing into a cliff, five skeletons wearing only Aviators and huge chain pendant necklaces with blinking eyes on them leapt out of the canyon, clattering their teeth threateningly and wielding huge swords and battle axes. Their bones were shockingly white and seemed polished and they made the strangest sound when they moved, like rustling paper.

"You never told me that those skeletons had a good taste in sunglasses!" I screamed at Percy.

"Nico, that's hardly the point!"

He was right. The skeletons were advancing on us and had us backed up against a formation of trees. I fumbled for the Stygian cigarette lighter in my pocket and drew it out with a curse. Flipping it out, I pointed it at the skeletons, but between Percy and me, we only had one weapon.

"Can you summon water from here?" I hissed at him.

"Can you summon your Underworld friends from here?" Percy replied. "This morning I was doing a training session with the little daughters of Poseidon and they dared me to summon water from as far away source as I could, and I still haven't recovered! They made me do it repeatedly and summon greater amounts of water each time!"

"_Enough chitchat!"_ shrieked the lead skeleton in the most hideous tone I had ever heard. It sounded nails on a chalkboard, haunted house screaming, and mice squeaking all at once.

"By the gods, what happened to your voice?" I couldn't help asking him.

"_Shut up!" _ The skeleton brandished an axe at me. _"Now which one of you is Perseus Jackson and which one of you is Nico di Angelo?"_

"Are we that popular?" I snickered, and then jabbed at him with a slice that should have cut him apart into two pieces.

He didn't, however. The blade just went inside his "body" and then out again in a fluid moment, like he was just colored air.

"Ah, shit," I frowned at the advancing skeletons. It seemed like ten more, all decked out in Aviator sunglasses and eye pendants, had jumped out of the crevasse while the lead dude had us cornered. "Why aren't these guys from the Underworld? Killing them would be so much easier."

"There's no way we can defeat these guys," Percy announced, brow furrowed.

"I thought as much," I said.

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**A/N: Blah. Blah blah blah. I practically butchered the Greek language back there. I hope Yahoo Babel Fish is accurate, but whatever. REVIEW!!! NOW. Next up is a bit of Cres's real history and Capture the Flag! Oh yeah, and the outcome of the skeleton attack. Haha.**


	3. Sleep Comes Easy

**A/N: This chapter took forever . . . and I'm a total liar. You'll see later. Anyways. **

Arrow of the Fallen - Chapter Three: Sleep Comes Easy

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The skeletons forced us to our knees, tied our hands together, and knotted gags tightly around our mouths. The gags tasted like old kitchen rags and I wanted to barf, but I couldn't get enough air to do it. Though we were in the middle of a pretty open forest, I felt claustrophobic.

"_Hold still,"_ snickered the lead skeleton that seemed like the only one who could talk.

He beckoned two of the skeletons over and they held their pendants out to us so we could see the gruesome winking red eye. I couldn't resist the urge to make fun of skeletons wearing jewelry, but I couldn't get the words out of the mouth. The gag pressed painfully into my gums.

In a blinding red flash, the pendants lit up like strobe lights and the skeletons pointed them at us. We tried to shield our eyes, but my hands were bound and I had forgotten. The eye pendant enlarged to the size of a large door and the pupil was soon the size of a dinner plate. Red light swirled around my eyes and I started getting dizzier and dizzier, close to passing out. A black hand reached out in the middle of the light and started to drag me into the pupil of the eye, and I couldn't fight it at all, merely watched dazedly at the black hand, and then I couldn't tell what it was at all, it could've just been a bear –

"NICO!"

The redness vanished immediately and I collapsed onto the grass, my vision blurring with blue and black. Gasping and panting, I rolled onto my side to see who had screamed.

I squinted into the distance and saw a girl leap off a horse's back. Then my vision cleared some more and I saw that it was Cres, who had gotten a ride from Chiron.

"Cres," I gasped out into my gag. "You idiot . . ."

She couldn't hear me, and I couldn't really hear myself.

"Nico, stay down!"

With difficulty, I turned my head to my other side. Percy had managed to crawl near me and his gag was cast askew, hanging around his neck. In awkward movements, Percy managed to wiggle his way to where I dropped my Styggie, and sawed off the rope binding my hands. He grimaced in pain when the Stygian iron cold bit into his flesh, immediately releasing the sword when I was free. I ripped off my gag and helped untie his hands. We both tried to stand up but there was no point. Something about those pendants had drained the energy from us and all we could do was writhe around helplessly while Cres – why did Chiron bring Cres? – tried to defeat those skeletons.

I dug into my jean pockets for my supply of ambrosia but I realized I had put it into my jacket and swore out loud. I opened my mouth to ask Percy if he had any ambrosia or nectar but then the most piercing sound I've ever heard _in my whole_ life sounded in my ears and I screamed out loud. Like really screamed. I convulsed into a fetal position with my hands slapped over my ears, but I could still hear the lead skeleton shrieking above the rest.

"_Master! You have the blood of Master, the kin of Master!" _the skeleton wailed like a banshee.

"Who is 'Master'?" bellowed Cres, who was the only one of us still standing and seemed unaffected by the screeching noise. Chiron was in paralysis beside her, just like Percy and I were.

"_Crescent Fallen, oh how Master would kill us if he caught us taking the Arrow Ichor from one of his own blood," _it screeched. _"He commanded us never, ever to extract the Arrow Ichor from him, for he did not want to destroy his long lost siblings!"_

The screaming wouldn't stop. I could feel something wet coming out of my ears, but I didn't dare remove my hands from my ears, though little protection they provided.

"Evaporators, you will tell me _now_ who your master is!" she shouted over the cacophony.

Who were the Evaporators?

"_Oh, oh, oh, and Master insisted to be obedient to all his blood, all his blood, even of his siblings Rhys and –"_

Cres cried out abruptly at the same time the skeleton's screaming stopped.

That was because the skeletons didn't exist anymore.

Every skeleton was replaced by a searing pillar of fire and when the sparks died down, the gorge had closed itself up, like it had never been there. Like the skeletons had never been there. It was like who ever this Master dude was, he had killed his own disciples before they revealed his secrets.

"Oh my God, Nico, are you okay?"

I finally uncovered my ears. "Fallen, you are the biggest idiot ever," I sighed. Except I couldn't hear myself. Since no one was yelling, my ears were just a roar of sound. I looked at my hands and they were covered in blood. Horror boiled up inside me. What if I went deaf forever?

Chiron had already galloped over, but I couldn't hear him. He bent down and gave me exactly what I needed: a piece of ambrosia.

I gulped it down and immediately felt energized, the roaring in my ears dying down a little. Pain faded from everywhere in my body and I turned to see Percy getting up from the ground. With a frown, I stood up, but then someone pushed me down again.

"Jeez, Cres," I told her without hearing myself. "What do you want?"

She said something to me that I couldn't hear, and then motioned that she was going to take off her shirt.

"_What?" _I gasped at her.

She scowled and pointed to me.

"Why?"

Annoyance painted on her face, she reached over and pulled off my shirt, her face blushing a deep red that matched her hair. She bunched up the shirt and then wiped the blood off my hands and ears.

So that's why. Haha.

"I know you love my shirtlessness – oh! I can hear again!"

"Well isn't _that_ great, di Angelo," she rolled her eyes. "Why don't you go mute instead?"

"You're so cruel," I fake cried.

"That's a good thing."

Chiron bowed his head gravely. "I believe this is the new problem facing Camp Half-Blood," he said to Cres, "and it involves some family of _yours._"

"But my father – Mitch – he – how could he be a half-blood?"

"Mitchell Fallen," Chiron said, so I knew Cres had told him who her father was. "And a brother named Rhys. No, it can't be . . ."

His face darkened considerably. "After capture the flag, all of you will report back to the Rec Room to discuss Cres's parentage. Oh, and Nico and Percy? You guys won't be playing in tonight's game."

"What?!" I yelped. "Look, I'm perfectly fine. All I need is a little bit more ambrosia and a regeneration session with some dead souls and _I'll. Be. Fine."_

Chiron sighed. "You need time for your ears to heal."

"Hey, I'm like the person who knows Cres the most out of all of us, and I have to teach her how to play and survive a Half-Blood capture the flag game. Right, Scentie?"

Cres did a little innocent girl smile. "Right, Coco."

Percy went off to barf in the corner.

* * *

"Ok, people, here's the teams for tonights capture the flag! The red team includes the Hecate, Poseidon, Hephaestus, Aeolus, Athena, Aphrodite, Harmonia, Deimo, Phobos, Dionysus, Hebe, Janus, Peitho, the Nike Guys, Morpheus, Hygeia, and Asclepius cabins!"

"Why the Nike Guys?" Cres asked me. After the skeleton incident, she was now decked out in a bright orange camp T-shirt, shorts, and ditched the boots for sneakers.

"Usually we divide the sons and daughters of Nike because they have a strong influence over which team wins or loses, being demigods of victory and all," I explained. "They're really powerful."

She nodded. "I didn't know they had black versions of the camp T-shirts," she said, pointing to mine. "Or then I would have gotten one."

"I dyed it myself and repainted on the words in silver," I said proudly. "I don't look good in bright colors."

"I don't either," she said, tugging at the fabric.

I thought she looked fine.

"The blue team are the cabins Apollo, Ares, Zeus, Hades, Tethys, Chione, Alexiares, Hermes, Eris, Demeter, Iris, Eros, Mnemosyne, the Nike Girls, Themis, Nemesis, Isao, and Aceso. This also includes Cres Fallen!"

"So I'm the only undetermined half-blood around here?"

"Yeah." I was surprised she picked up the lingo so quickly; we had only told her what Camp Half-Blood was all about a few hours ago.

Sighing, she unsheathed the sword I had given her. "I have no idea how to use this, Coco. Can't I just use my Molotovs?"

I tilted my head. "I think you can, actually. As long as there's not that much lighter fluid in them. And will you stop calling me Coco?"

She pouted. "But I like the name!"

"Who's this?"

I looked behind me. One of the most annoying and arrogant guy I had ever met stood there. He looked like some model, as usual, his camp shirt looking like a designer piece and jeans that were so low-rise they were probably going to fall off. "Van."

"Nico." The dude smirked. "Are you the undetermined gal?"

"Yeah, I'm Cres Fallen," said Cres, already getting that stupid starry eyed look that all girls got when they met him.

"I'm Van Ryon, son of Alexiares, who is the son of Hercules."

"Oh, that's really cool!" she giggled.

I couldn't roll my eyes fast enough. "Hades FTW," I said under my breath.

"Nico! Dude, I haven't seen you in ages!" James Alfred, son of Aeolus slapped my shoulder.

"James! Don't kill me with the spear again, right?" I laughed. "At least this time we're on different teams. Where's Rox?

"Over here," she stepped into view, took one look at me and said, "Damn, how'd you get so tall? You're taller than me now! So unfair!"

"I'm a guy, I should be taller than you."

"I'm still taller than James," she ruffled the hair of her twin brother.

"James could be _a woman?"_ I whispered in horror.

"You suck," James scowled.

"Alright, the game will start in ten minutes. Blue team, west woods, red team, east woods! Boundaries are the treelines and Zephynos Creek. Remember, no intentional maiming and all magic items are allowed! Good luck!" Chiron cheered.

We planted our flag in a clearing deep in our territory that was backed up by a steep little cliff hill on one side. You would only need a small guard team to defend it 'cause it would be impossible to drop in from the cliff side.

"You guys," Sorcha Bower, the cabin counselor of the Iris cabin called. "Who's captaining?"

"VAN!" screamed half of the girls and a couple of the guys.

"NICO!" screamed the rest.

"Alright then," said Van, charming smiles and all. "Shall we co-captain?"

I wanted to puke. "Sure!" I exclaimed brightly. "I call offense!"

We glared at each other. We had said that at the same exact time.

"Van, your father is one of the freakin' gatekeepers of Olympus. You were _born_ to be defense," I argued.

"Well, sometimes you have to take the whole team in account, you know, Nic?" BARF BARF BARF BARF. "I realized that both Morpheus's children are on the red team and I'm sure they will be the main opposing offense. You're the only guy in camp who can fight Michael and Lily and even put _them_ to sleep, so wouldn't it make sense to put you on defense?"

I hated how he was right. Oh, and how all the girls wilted under his eye.

"Concentrate, people," Laken, daughter of Chione, the snow goddess, commanded. I loved how she was like one of the hottest girls in camp but didn't fall under Van's spell. Or should l say curse.

"Right. Van will lead the Ares, Zeus, Hermes, Tethys, and Chione cabins as offense. The Apollo cabin along with the Iaso, Nike, Iris, and Mnemosyne cabins will be hanging around midfield. Offense should bring their wounded to the Iaso dude, AKA Whitman. Defense with me will be Demeter, Eros, Themis, Nemesis, and Aceso cabins. If anyone else gets hurt, bring them to Jessica," I said pointing to the daughter of Aceso.

Van actually nodded in agreement. "I want the offenders to attack exactly when the game starts, surprising the team other team. You guys should aim to get past both opposing offenders and midfielders. Midfielders, I want you to cut down everyone who crosses the line. Will, I want you to lead the Apollo cabin in a full frontal attack, shooting arrows from high ground. Sorcha, some illusion rainbows would be cool."

"Yeah, so offenders, once you get halfway to the flag, I want you to break up into two groups. Eshaya and Laken," I explained, looking at the daughter of Tethys, the fresh water goddess, and the daughter of Chione, "I want you to do everything you can to stop Percy from ever coming near our territory. Turn his water to snow, redirect it. Ares cabin, fight with them midway into their territory. The rest of the offenders, you have to, have to, cover Kian, who is basically the fastest runner in camp. The rest of the Hermes cabin and Chris who has the power to zap everything with lightning should be able to cover you. Get the flag and run like hell back to our base. Ares cabin, Eshaya, and Laken, when you see Kian running back, make a powerful shield around them."

A slow smile was taking over Van's face. "For defense, I want the Demeter kids with vines, fighting off those Dionysus losers. Eros, love enchantment would be _tres cool._ And Jenna and Rachel, I want to see that swordfighting kickass of yours with all the epic powers of Themis and Nemesis _combined._ Point is, Nico is as important as _the flag_ in this game. If he's distracted by a red team offender, Michael and Lily will have us. Make sure Nico is always free and can just concentrate on defeating the son and daughter of Morpheus."

"You're pretty smart," I told Van after he was done explaining.

"Thanks," he replied.

It was a moment to remember.

"What about me?"

I looked into the crowd at Cres, who looked a bit forlorn, exactly how I did a few years ago when I was still undetermined.

"Cres Fallen," Van said in concentration.

"She's can actually hurt monsters with Molotov cocktails. Midfield with the Apollo cabin lookout?"

"Perfect." Van snapped his fingers. "Everyone get in position. The game starts in three."

The offenders and midfielders ran off into the distance, and I scouted out the area around the flag, looking for places that people could sneak up on us. I placed each of the Demeter kids guarding the few blind spots and put each of the Eros demigods between them. Jenna and Rachel were behind me for safe guarding, and Jessica was placed in a strategic position behind a boulder so she could keep herself unharmed but throw her deadly accurate knives at the same time.

The horn sounded with a blast and I could hear the battle cries of our team already plunging into enemy territory. The sound soon died down as they moved further into the red team east woods. But still you could hear the clashing battle at the midline. Their offense should be attacking any minute.

Then they came into sight, a few minutes later. They were led by the Hephaestus, Dionysus, Janus, and a few of the Athena cabin. At first, I felt relieved, the Michael and Lily hadn't showed up.

But they came out right behind them and we were officially outnumbered.

The Demeter cabin threw up a wall of ivy before the red team could react, and it tied up the Dionysus kids, so they wouldn't be a problem. "Thank the Gods," I breathed. The good thing about the Demeter demigods was that they acted _fast. _Two of the enemy's attacking force was gone already.

Eden Vanluvven and her half-siblings, laid on the arrows and love magic, distracting the guys from Athena and Hephaestus. The Janus half-blood was knocked down by one of Jessica's knives.

I stared at them, trying to figure out why this would be so easy. Sorcha Bower must have really poured on illusion after illusion on them; they seemed already tired.

Of course, Michael and Lily were not.

"Hey hey, it's Nico, here to defend the flag!" Lily giggled.

"Lily, haven't seen you in a while." I cracked a smile.

"Nico, as much as you're one of my greatest friends, you won't remember what happens next," Michael smirked.

I shrugged. "As long as this day gets more interesting, I'm happy."

Lily grinned.

Both half-siblings outstretched an arm toward me and their eyes turned the shade of hazy purple and a mix of grey, the exact color that described the word "sleep". I wanted to curl up right there on the ground and sleep for at least a day or two. I fell on my knees and was about to blink out when I saw their little egoistic smirks and the magic left me immediately.

Raising my own hands towards them, I willed them to go to sleep. I was the freakin' son of Hades, I should rock at this. Lily's eyelids fluttered but she hastily steadied herself. All the other fighting happening in the clearing died down to a dull roar in our ears and just background movement in our eyes. We stood there, facing each other, forcing one of us to go to sleep. They were incredibly strong, and I felt the immense pressure to give in. It was like running a mile or two and you really don't feel like running the last leg even though you're really fit and athletic.

I could tell I was nearly there, but strength was draining out of me like blood that came out of that dude in COD 6 I played earlier today.

_Give in . . . give in . . . give in . . . sleep . . ._

_NO. _

I forced my powers into their brains, trying to find the passage way that would knock them out for a long time. My eyelids flickered for a moment and my body was getting amazingly tired.

_Just sleep for a while._

_No, I won't._

_Why not?_

Lily fell asleep first. I think it was a turning point. I was so exhausted that I didn't notice her collapse to the grass, but I did notice I suddenly had enough power to gain over Michael, who had cold sweat breaking all over his body. For a second, I thought I may have lost, when Michael suddenly put on energy I don't know where he got from, but it only lasted for that long – a second. I pressed harder into him, mentally closing his eyes.

You_ go to sleep. _You_ give in._

Finally, he passed out, his knees giving out like his half-sister's had.

When he fell, I fell too, black swarming into my eyes. I managed to squint an eye open to look at my teammates, but they were all on the ground. What had happened?

"Hades FTW," I said, before black washed over my head.

* * *

**A/N: So I lied that I would tell you what Cres was all about. See anything about her heritage _anywhere?_ I don't. Next chapter, I promise, promise, that you'll know who Cres's dad really is and a hint about her mom. REVIEW PLEASE AND I WILL SMILE AT YOU - and probably freak you out. **


	4. Thirty Years Ago

**A/N: No more exams, no more projects!!!! Winter break starts in a few days, and then I'll be able to update like a normal person!!! Hooray!!! Disclaimer on second chapter, read on!**

Arrow of the Fallen - Chapter Four: Thirty Years Ago

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I woke up feeling cheerful and well-rested, albeit a little light-headed. "Whoa," I said, "that was the best sleep I've had in ages."

My eyes focused on several people sitting beside my bedside. "Whoa," I repeated. "Stalker much? Do you guys usually watch me sleep or something?"

Roxy let out a strangled sob and launched into my body. "We thought you were dead! We thought everyone was dead when they called for me and James to lift you out of the clearing! Chiron said you were just asleep, but you were hardly breathing! And you didn't stir at all, none of you did! Do you know how horrible it's been, these last few days?"

"Wait, slow down," I told her. Everything came rushing back, the crazy mind fight with Michael Night and Lily Raemon of the Morpheus cabin, how I'd beaten them, but how I passed out right after that. How everyone else in the clearing looked like they had died. "A few _days?"_

A boy leaned forward on his chair, and I realized it was James. He looked harassed, dark circles under his eyes, hair all mussed up. "You were the last one to wake."

"I can't believe this," I groaned. "What happened?"

"The fast Hermes kid, Kian, had already taken off with our flag and was heading towards the boundary line. We had barely any campers left to fight, so blue team – your team – won. Chiron blew the horn three times to signal the end of the game and the blue team's victory, but after ten minutes, you guys from the clearing weren't appearing. Chiron sent Percy and Annabeth to go find you, and Annabeth ran back asking for the Aeolus twins to lift the bodies – the people. Rox and I could barely channel any wind at all when we saw you passed out like that. All of the other people around you were asleep too, because of the power you were discharging from the battle with Michael and Lily. We lifted you guys to the infirmary but you wouldn't wake up until a day after; then all the bystanders were revived. You, Michael, and Lily were still out cold. Twenty or so hours after that, Michael and Lily woke up around the same time. Two more days passed, and now you're finally awake. Everyone was losing hope. They brought in Michael and Lily to see if they could awaken you, but they couldn't. No one knew how, so Chiron just told us to wait."

"I'm really glad you're alive, man," someone else said.

"Shoots!" I grinned, "Didn't know you arrived."

"I had a sleepover movie marathon with a few friends in Philly, and I came back yesterday to hear that you were dead to the world. Almost literally."

Vincent "Shoots" Barrel was a year older than James and I, but he was one of our best friends. A demigod from the cabin Apollo, he _loved _poetry. It got annoying.

"Yeah, so you have like fifty more fans waiting for you outside this room," Shoots reported. "Dylan, go run and get Chiron."

I sat up higher in my bed to look down at Dylan. I had no idea he was there.

"Your mommie came over to campie and yelled at Percieee for a longie time," Dylan reported in a cute baby voice.

"Oh, gods, was Sally that mad at Percy? It's not like he did anything wrong."

"Yeah, well," James said, shrugging.

"NICO!" Chiron shouted, entering the infirmary. "You're back with us, boy!"

"I guess I am," I laughed.

He leaned over me and whispered into my ear. "We're having the meeting tonight."

I nodded.

"What meeting?" asked Dylan.

"It's secret business," I said. "You don't need to know."

* * *

The camp nurse declared me physically and mentally healthy at noon, and Roxy, James, Shoots, and I played a rousing game of volleyball before dinner. Michael and Lily came up to the Hades table just to tell me their apologies and I apologized back. We laughed at each other for being so powerful that we could put other people asleep that were just _next to us _at the time. But Lily kind of creeped me out with all the eyelash batting. I can take flirting, of course, but not excessively from a girl who was _twelve years old. _Afterwards, me and Percy met up in the Rec Room with Cres a few minutes before seven o' clock. Cres was pacing the room, eating Cheetos with an obsessive abandon. She looked up when we arrived.

"You actually kind of had me worried there," she said, disgust clouding her features. "I can't believe I said that."

"Don't worry, all the girls said the same."

She made a face at Percy and muttered something like, " . . . huge ego . . . thinks he's God's gift to women . . ."

"Oh, but I _am _God's gift to women."

"You know who _really_ is? Van Ryon."

"No way!" I exclaimed. "That psycho kitty? I can't believe you said _that!"_

"Don't say you don't like him," Cres crunched on a Cheeto. "I think you think that he's really cool and smart and a good leader, but you're too _manly_ to admit him as a friend."

"Manly, I am, alright."

She rolled her eyes mightily and opened her mouth to speak again, but Chiron had galloped into the room. "Sorry for the hold-up, had to talk to Dionysus about our strawberry farm. You are all here?"

We nodded.

"Then I should get right down to business. These skeletons I have no knowledge over, but I'm sure you would like to know a bit about Mitchell Fallen."

Percy frowned, disappointed. I think he and I were both looking forward to learning what those skeletons were and how to kill them.

"Alright," Chiron sighed, opening a bag of chips. "Here we go.

"It was, let's see, about thirty years ago, when the Fallen triplets were seven. Mitchell, your father, and his brother and sister, Rhys and Katrina, arrived at the foot of Half-Blood Hill just as dawn showed on the horizon. It was early June, and they told me that a man in a business suit called a taxi for them to this address. I took them in, of course, and made them campers. They stayed undetermined for eight summers, and I couldn't understand why. They were extremely powerful and for some reason could handle all weapons like the gods themselves when it came to defense and their strength grew when the sun was out. They could control water as skillfully as any children of Poseidon, but they weren't demigods of him for they could only use fresh water. They were mysterious in a lot of ways; I could never tell if they were 'good' or 'evil.'

"Mitchell made many friends and was one of the most popular boys at camp back then. Katrina was extremely pretty but used her beauty as a weapon." Chiron laughed. "All the boys fell for her and were scared of her at the same time. Rhys was quiet and always looked like he was waiting for something to happen.

"During the summer of the year the triplets were sixteen, none of them showed up at camp. I grew worried. Where had they gone? I knew they went to a private school up in Connecticut and lived with their father Seth Fallen, but I couldn't contact any of them. In the newspaper, I read that Mitchell had done a few commercials, auditioned for the main role in a new TV show, and had gotten that role. Over that summer, he would be filming season one in L.A. My concern over the youngest Fallen triplet was quenched, but the newspapers said nothing about Katrina and Rhys – or Seth, for that matter. In a rising teen idol, shouldn't family history be one of the categories that the paparazzi attacked? There was no information about the other triplets, and Mitchell wouldn't reveal anything in the interviews. After two years or so, I stopped searching feverishly for Katrina and Rhys. By that time, Mitchell Fallen had become the next big thing in Hollywood. If anything was discovered about Mitchell's family, it would make front headlines, I was sure."

"So that's it?" Cres had her head on the ping pong table, a bag of Cheetos forgotten in front of her. "You don't know who gave my father his god blood?"

"Unfortunately, I do not."

Percy slumped backwards into his chair. "Who is Cres's mother?"

I looked at Cres almost expectantly, waiting for her to leap out of her chair in fury, like she did with me. Instead, to my annoyance, she parted with the information without protest. "Shannon Pike. But you would know her as Cheneyney."

"CHENEYNEY?" Percy and I exclaimed as one. "No way!"

"It's true," Cres said. "You know the movie _My Own Guardian Angel?_"

"Yeah, it starred Mitchell Fallen – and – oh – Shannon Pike," I realized.

Cres nodded. "She turned into Cheneyney once she left her acting career and went for singing instead. I mean, why am I telling you this? You guys all know Cheneyney, Billboard Top 100 _ruler_ and all that. I'm sure she wasn't like, I don't know, a goddess, and she sure wasn't a half-blood either. Mitchell didn't seem like a half-blood when I met him for the first time last year . . ."

"Crescent," Chiron tried to say.

"I just can't handle this. I need answers. I'm not going to be the only undetermined person in this camp, hell, I didn't ask for this. I may sound like some brat in a fantasy movie like – like Eragon or something, but isn't this one big fantasy movie? I mean Greek gods were fantasy like before today and stuff, I knew I could see weird monsters, but that just seems so normal now, now that I have some weird uncle and aunt that I haven't ever heard about. And you guys are all taking this so calmly, but I was like a – what do you call it? – a _mortal_ before today and I'm not used to this kind of groundbreaking stuff! And f*ck you, di Angelo, I know you have a stupid smirk hidden on your face!"

I stood up calmly. "Fallen, that was uncalled for. We've all been through what you're going through right now, especially Percy. He's been through a bigger hell than you have, Cres. We're trying to help you here, so you can take our help, or leave it, your choice."

The girl glared at me, right hand twitching like she was about to flick me off.

Chiron patted her shoulder kindly. "I'm sure we will find the truth about your heritage soon, Cres. I intend to start hitting the books immediately, in the meantime: you can continue your training here at camp."

"I'm afraid I can give you some of the answers you're looking for," a cool female voice interrupted Chiron.

We all whipped our heads back to face her, a girl leaning on the doorway of the entrance to the Rec Room. She looked about thirteen years old, with a beautiful face and red hair pulled into a French braid down her back. Her eyes glittered intensely into each of ours in turn.

"Lady Artemis?" I gasped. My body tingled. It was all because of her and her Hunters that Bianca died way earlier than her prime . . . . I forced the thought down. Bianca's fate was laid out for her ever since she was born. Even Artemis was a pawn of Fates'.

"Lady Artemis, I did not receive any news of your arrival and didn't have time to prepare –"

The moon goddess interrupted Chiron for the second time. "It is fine, dear Chiron." The words coming out of her mouth did not fit a thirteen year old. "Percy Jackson." A shadow of a smile flickered onto her face and then disappeared. "And Crescent Paula Fallen."

She said nothing and did nothing else and we stared at her for a while.

"There is something you should know about Shannon Pike, your mother," she said to Cres. "You are right; she is no more half-blood than Barack Obama."

Percy's eyebrows quirked up from hearing the strange comparison between the singer, Cheneyney, and the current president of the United States.

"No, she has no god blood in her, yet she has been touched by a god. I, Artemis, the goddess of the moon, the Lady of Wild Things, sole protector of women, blessed Shannon Pike many years ago. I blessed her and gave a mortal the strength of the moon."

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**A/N: Hated the conclusion of this chapter, too abrupt. PLEASE REVIEW!!!! Thanks for all the people who already reviewed, alerted, and favorited this story (and me). And if you haven't already, spread the holiday cheer!**


	5. Blood Status

**A/N: I thought I was gonna update more, I guess not. Disclaimer on Chapter Two, this chapter title has nothing to do with vampires (lol), blah blah, blah blah. Read on!**

Arrow of the Fallen - Chapter Five: Blood Status

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Sometimes I wish that the world could be simpler.

Like if only the Greeks just wanted fifteen gods, not hundreds of them. So those fifteen gods would have affairs with mortals, and there you have basic demigods. No blessings, no other interaction with mortals. And I would have thought Artemis, of all people, would honor that.

"You _blessed _her?" Percy said in a mixture of disbelief and curiosity. "And what happens to a mortal when a goddess _blesses_ her?"

"Well, a lot of things happen," Artemis said sarcastically. "The brain tells your sexual organs to start making hormones, which leads to puberty. You will begin to notice that you are growing taller, may have more hair than usual, and may develop a body odor."

"_Lady Artemis!"_ cried Chiron.

Artemis's expression turned stern, like she was mad at herself. A cold winter's breeze blew into the Rec Room. It tasted like cold moon. Though I didn't know what cold moon tastes like, I felt like I had suddenly transported to a dry and barren landscape. Percy, Chiron, and I all shivered from the sensation of Artemis's power, but Cres remained unaffected. What was she, some kind of Invincibility-Woman?

"I was acting childish and stupid. I had a fight with my idiotic brother right before I felt a kind of vibe coming from your mother, Crescent, who was going into labor in a hospital. She seemed to be in pain, but not physical pain. Emotional pain. You must know that Mitchell left her?" Artemis asked Cres.

"Yeah." And under her breath, she added. "The bastard."

"I needed to help her. I _am _the protector of women, after all. I was really ticked off about Apollo, he was telling me that one of my Hunters was running off with Apollo when everyone was sleeping, and I decided that this woman, Shannon Pike, should never, ever, fall under men's spell again, like my so called 'Hunter' did. So I blessed her."

"You're not really addressing the main question," I pointed out. "What happened to Cres's mother _after _you blessed her."

"See, that's the thing," sighed Artemis. "I'm not really sure."

"Um," Cres started. "My mom's really good with animals, and sometimes it seems like she can talk to them. She's really feminist, and I thought that was just only because my father left her. Her singing is amazing on nights of full moons, and that's why she always records new tracks or has concerts on those nights. People have started to call her – "

"'The Werewolf'. That's right," I said.

Cres nodded. "Those are all powers of yours, right, Lady Artemis? The Hunt, turning your back on men, and the moon. But I never realized . . . she could be . . . supernatural. I thought it was just my mother's quirks."

Artemis silently reached out a pale hand towards Cres and pressed it on the girl's forehead. "Yes, when I blessed Shannon Pike, I blessed you a little, too."

* * *

There was something totally off about Cres's expression when we walked out of the Rec Room. She didn't look heartbroken, freaked, sad, or even furious. Just blank.

Night was already falling and falling fast. Percy had gone off with Annabeth into the farther arenas, probably just to make out or something. Chiron remained talking to Artemis in the Big House.

Cres shuddered beside me and looked up into the sky. "Figures," she muttered at the full moon.

I didn't say anything.

"So is _your _family history so damn complicated?" she asked.

I looked at her. "Not really. My dad's Hades, and my mom's this Italian mortal. I had a sister, Bianca, who was a few years older than me."

"Had?"

"Yeah. Bianca and my mom both are dead."

She took a sharp intake of breath which I promptly ignored. "Gosh, that must be horrible."

"Not exactly what you think," I told her. "I visit Bianca at least once every month. Zeus killed my mom so I can't exactly find her in the Underworld yet. My dad's trying with his magic, but I think his real wife, Persephone, is blocking the spell."

"Yeah but isn't Persephone the goddess of nature or something? She's like not around half the time, right?" Cres asked.

"Goddess of Spring, and she has really strong powers or something. I don't know."

"So you can _visit_ dead people?"

"Yeah."

We had arrived at the Hermes cabin and I went in and picked up her small pack with everything she had here at camp. None of the Hermes campers were inside, which meant they were probably out at the camp store doing something naughty or collecting orders for food and other items to be smuggled in. I don't know if Chiron and the camp director Dionysus seriously didn't know about the camp smuggling business, or just chose to ignore it. I swear Connor Stoll has a shirt somewhere that says CHB Transportation Service for Goods est. 1957. Nineteen fifty seven. No kidding.

Cres was waiting impatiently outside, but looked a bit worried. "Is it creepy, having a cabin just to yourself?"

Chiron had said to move her temporarily to the Artemis cabin because of her 'blessed'-ness. She would be moved again once we found out where her physical god blood came from. AKA Mitchell Fallen's blood status.

When we neared the Artemis cabin, Cres's breath caught in her throat. The cabin glowed silver every full moon, and today was one of those nights. She ran into the cabin, happy like a little girl on Christmas day and came out again to the doorway where I was waiting.

"So, can I leave now?" I asked her, letting a fake bored expression cover my face.

"Jerk. Wait. I was gonna say that I wanted to thank you. But I said jerk first. Sorry. Reflex. Yeah, so thanks for everything you did these few days," she said, practically the first time she said my name and smiled at the same time.

"I was asleep half the time, but thanks for the thanks." I turned to leave, a smirk on my lips when she grabbed my arm with surprising strength (hello, Invincibility-Woman, so I guess it ain't as surprising at all) and pulled me into a bear hug.

"Whoa, Cres?" I cried, freaking out.

"Tomorrow, you're gonna teach me how to sword fight. I'm seriously lacking and all the other campers suck at teaching," she mumbled into my chest.

She may be Invincibility-Woman, but she's darn short. I had to really look down at her to say, "of course."

Then she lurched away from me. "And I _will _kick your ass at it, too!"

"You sure about that, little child?"

Punching me into the direction of my cabin, her eyes lit up when she saw a figure coming down the path. "Van!"

Oh. Great. The world's most arrogant, snobby, girl-playing boy who's named after a type of vehicle has appeared.

Well, actually, one day he was being a more self-righteous idiot than usual and I overheard him telling his multiple girlfriends that his name meant "from the family of." Which is kind of stupid, when my name means "victorious people."

"Hey_hey, _Cres. And Nico."

"Van."

Déjà vu times two!

"Van, come in here! This cabin's amazing!" Cres called from the doorway.

A slippery sneer decorated The Vehicle's face. "The best man has won," Van Ryon said sleazily.

"I was never a player in this 'game'," I said derisively. "I don't like her."

"Then who _do _you like? Roxanne?"

I felt queasy. "Roxy's just a friend." Thank the gods for that, the poor dude who marries her in the end.

Even in the moonlight, I saw his expression darken. "That's good, that's good," he murmured.

"What? Do you like _me?" _I laughed at him. "Douche."

"Ass. I like Rox – fuck." He stomped past me in his designer boots, bumping me roughly in the shoulder on purpose.

Wait, what? "You like who? Roxy? No way, Van, you like _Roxy?_" I yelled.

"Shut your fuckin' mouth, di Angelo. You don't know shit about me."

"I know you'll break Roxy's heart if she _even _let you date her. I know you break the hearts of every girl you meet."

The asshole disappeared into the Artemis cabin and slammed the door behind him without another word.

Hade's throne on a stick. I walked back to my cabin in a kind of daze. Van liked one of my best friends. No, that wasn't the biggest surprise; Van actually _liked _someone. Usually he treated girls like shit. What if – no way – Van Ryon was actually _human_ after all? Ick no, must erase that thought from my mind. There is no way The Vehicle could be remotely _homo sapien_. The jerkwad he is and all.

Inside my room was Shoots, James, and Van's newly discovered crush, Roxy. I wanted to tell her so freakin' bad that the very guy she hated liked her but somehow I resisted that urge.

"What's so hush-hush about that Cres Fallen girl anyway?" Roxy asked me right away.

"Yo, no 'hello,' any more?" I winced, fake taken-aback.

The guys gave me hurried greetings, but dear Rox just plowed on.

"It's like she's something special. She's not something special, is she?"

"She's special." I went through the drawers of my desk until I found the Smarties candy I bought from the Stoll Brothers this afternoon. Unwrapping a roll of the pastel candies, I surveyed my best friends. Shoots was surfing the net with my laptop. His mom always refused to buy him one and he sucked at saving money himself. James was slumped over my bed, reading some Japanese manga volume from my ginormous collection. Roxy looked like she was Facebook chatting with Shoots on her iPhone even though they were both in the same room. I rolled my eyes.

"You guys aren't typing trash about me and James, are you?"

"What?!" James shot up. "They're not doing that stupid Facebook chat with each other, are they?"

"They are." I ruffled through my clothes, found my super comfortable fleece PJ pants, and quickly changed into them while Rox was still giggling over her LCD touch screen.

"We're not!" Roxy whined. "It's _MSN_, not Facebook!"

"MSN, Facebook, Skype, Gmail, AIM, Yahoo, Hotmail, Meebo, and iChat chats are _all the same. _You're either insulting us or you aren't!" exclaimed James.

"Calm down, 'lil bro."

"BIG bro."

"You're still little."

Suddenly Shoots whooped like a madman. "Found it, Roxters!"

"Found _WHAT?!"_ James looked so frustrated it was funny.

We all rushed at the computer screen with crazy expectations, but my face fell at the website pulled up. "So what? It's just Connor and Travis Stoll's blog."

"Yeah, but this ain't any old entry," Shoots said dramatically, pressing his lip ring piercing with his tongue.

"It probably is 'any old entry' to Nico. He was _there _when it happened!" Roxy cut in.

I looked more closely at the blog.

"_THE NEXT GREAT PROPHECY REVEALED!" _the headline shouted.

"No way," I breathed. "How did the Stoll bros get their hands on this?"

"I remember this!" James said. "Three years ago, Chiron blew up at the Stoll's for this very blog entry! He wanted to keep the next Great Prophecy secret from everyone and on the Net 'cuz Titans and mortals both could read it! Once the Stoll's took it down, no damage was done 'cuz hardly anyone saw it anyway."

"Yup," said Shoots. "The Stoll Brothers put button cameras in all the arenas, the Mess Hall, the Big House, and even some of the cabins. Finally their hard work paid off and they got a recording of Rachel Dare saying the prophecy. The bros had to delete the entry, as James said, but nothing – well, almost nothing, especially in the hands of amateurs – can escape the Wayback machine."

"The Way-what?"

"Jamesie! Come on, it's the machine that lets you see past versions or deleted versions of anything on the web," Rox explained.

Shoots read the prophecy out loud in a solemn voice.

"_Seven half-bloods shall answer the call._

_To storm or fire, the world must fall._

_An oath to keep with final breath,_

_And foes bear arms to the Doors of Death."_

"Ominous," Rox grinned from ear to ear.

"I remember this!" I exclaimed, like the exact copy of James a minute ago. "Apollo, your dad," I told Shoots, "Was there and he didn't give a damn about his prophecy. He was like, 'who cares.'"

"That's my dad," Shoots proudly announced.

Funny person to be proud of . . .

"So obviously, since this Cres girl is so _special_, she must be in the prophecy," Rox deducted. "One of the seven half-bloods to answer the call. And since Nico here knows all about her, you're also one. All of the main character's best friends get to be part of the proph too. That's five half-bloods right there. Who else?"

"You _want_ to be part of the prophecy?" I frowned. "When Percy was part of the old one, he seemed like he was dying half the time. Mentally and physically. Anyway, Cres isn't a half-blood."

"What?" they all yelled.

"Ugh, I wasn't supposed to tell you that," I moaned. "She's like quarter-blood. Or maybe she _is _a half-blood. It's really unclear right now."

Rox gave me a look. "Yeah, okay, fine, whatever. Back to the prophecy. We have five contenders, and we need two more."

"Van Ryon?" I suggested.

Out of nowhere, a pillow bopped me in the head. "di Angelo! You on drugs or something?"

"No! Get away from me! You're mean!" I fake sobbed.

"What Nic means to say is that Van has been hanging around Cres these days so like Nico, guilty by association," James said, going back to his manga.

"Van hangs around every girl he meets," Rox said, matter of factly. "Well that makes six."

"There's like no one else, and I don't want to think about this right now," I complained. "I don't want to know who has to keep an oath to their final breath."

"Your loss," said Shoots and they took the conversation back to its MSN format.

There was nothing better to do at eleven o' clock, and the Harpies didn't really care who was breaking into the Hades cabin since I could order them around and stuff, so I went to sleep.

* * *

"_What would you like to order today, young man?" _

"_Uh, can I have the Big Mac set with a side of large French fries?"_

"_Any drinks?" _

"_A medium Coke."_

"_Coming right up, Nico." _

"_Wait, how'd you know my name?"_

"_Excuse me? You're only dating my daughter."_

_I looked up at him for real this time, not as a McDonald's cashierman but a real person. "I'm not dating anyone."_

"_You broke up with my girl?"_

_He took off the visor covering his eyes and I saw the face that decorated every movie theater in the world. "But you're Mitchell Fallen!"_

"_That's right."_

_Clouds swirled from the lights inside the store and covered the place until I could only see white. The clouds parted after a few seconds and I was staring into the face of another man. But unlike Mitchell, he seemed young, only eighteen or so. Mitchell looked in his forties even for a movie star._

_He looked like Mitchell Fallen, but his eyes were darker, narrower, as if the eyelids had grown closer from distrust. His hair was not highlighted with blonde like Mitchell's was, but a darker brown. A scar shaped like a hybrid between a cross and a star stretched over his left cheekbone all the way to his chin._

"'_To storm or fire, the world must fall.' Now who is storm? My brother or I? Who is fire?" he poured Coke from the soda machine._

"_Rhys Fallen?" _

"_The one and only." His mouth quirked up into a smirk. "I think I'm storm. And the world will fall by my hands, not my weak brother who cannot remember who he really is. He has been lost this whole time, would it really be any different if he stayed a celebrity?" _

_The clouds rose again and swirled over the twin brother. "Wait! Rhys!" I called, using my hands to dispense the clouds. It didn't work._

_I waited for my vision to clear from the white. And in Rhys place was a girl who looked the same age as Rhys, and looked so like the other two brothers that I knew it must be Katrina. She was beautiful, golden brown locks, high cheekbones, full lips, and round eyes full of intrigue. _

"_Ah, Nico, might you be the one to keep an oath with final breath?" she smirked in the same exact way as Rhys did. She tapped my nose with a slightly French fry grease stained finger, leaned forward and kissed me softly on the lips._

_I jerked back, blushing like a tomato. "Katrina!"_

_But she was already murmuring to herself while she shoveled French fries. I think that the kissing thing was only part of her culture – or something. "'And foes bear arms to the Doors of Death.'"_

_She seemed worried. "Styx, I don't understand what you're doing. You never said anything about an army attacking the Underworld. Styx, I thought you made it simple. I – I have your blood, I am your kin but what good does that do me? I cannot take an oath with you for you are the goddess _of _that river, and somehow you always find a way to trick me . . ."_

_The clouds swirled in, and this time I didn't fight them. The Fallen triplets were kin to the goddess Styx?_

_

* * *

_

Someone was knocking on the door when I woke up. "NICO! WAKE UP! RISE AND SHINE! LITTLE EMOBOY!"

"Who called me emo?" I yelled back, getting up to get the door. I nearly tripped over James who somehow was on the ground using his sister's leg as a pillow. I made a mental note to take a picture of that later.

"Finally!" shouted Cres who looked shiny and bright and annoyingly perky for this early in the morning. I looked at her, realizing that I _freakin' kissed her aunt._ But she was the one looking at me like _I _was the weirdo here. Her mouth was gaped open like an idiot's.

"What're you gaping at? Gods." I need coffee.

She kept on staring at me and I traced her line of sight directly into my abs. I wasn't so tired that I couldn't double over, laughing my ass off. So I did. Laugh my ass off. "So a man needs to wear a shirt when he goes to sleep now, does he?"

She went red. "A _man_ should know to grab a shirt before opening the door to a stranger knocking on it."

"Yeah, okay," I made a move to go back and get one, but I turned around, like I changed my mind. "Whatever, Fallen. Hey, guess what! I had this creepy dream that I met all three of the Fallen triplets!"

To my surprise, she nodded. "So did I." Wow. Did we have the same dream? This stuff only happens in the movies. She wasn't finished, though. "I have Styx, Artemis, and Eos blood inside me."

Nah, never mind. I don't think we had the same dream.

* * *

**A/N: Yeah, so I was getting pretty tired of holding back where the heck Cres sprung from. All parentage will be revealed next chapter, including an actual PLOT. Oh, and do any of you guys think Cres is shallow and stupid? I do. (I even like Rox better than her now) I'll try to improve her. REVIEW!!!! It only takes a minute!!!**


	6. NSF

**A/N: Happy New Year!!! I hope you guys all had great holidays :D Disclaimer on Chapter 2, and I also do not own Beyonce Knowles or Kanye West. Sorry this chapter took so long but finally here it is:**

Arrow of the Fallen - Chapter Six: NSF

* * *

"Wait, stop!" I exclaimed before Cres could say anything.

Her expression went from confused to irritated. "I thought you would _want _to know what my blood is."

"I do want to know! But it's like six o'clock in the morning, and you know what I have to do to stay alive at this hour?"

"Huh, what? Alive?"

I looked at her. "I need coffee."

"You've got to be kidding me!"

But I was already bounding past her and running to the Mess Hall.

"At least put on – one – freakin' – SHIRT!" she screamed after me.

Psh. Whatever.

Hardly anyone was up yet, since it was practically dawn. Wait a sec, dawn? Didn't Cres say that she had blood from Eos, too, who was basically the goddess of dawn? Cres woke up at this hour every single day? I felt bad for her mother.

So the Mess Hall. It had definitely grown (like every other building and structure in Camp Half-Blood) after Percy told the gods to start claiming their children. Most of the minor gods and goddesses had only one or two children so instead of each cabin having their own table, minor cabins combined to make up the larger tables. It was free seating during breakfast and lunch, but at dinner, the order of tables and cabins were assigned. I usually sat next to the Hermes and Nike cabins during dinner. The magical breakfast buffet started up at 4:30 AM for early wakers or insomnia sufferers, making the Mess Hall the place to be in the morning. Gossip traveled so fast sometimes people woke up early on purpose to get the latest sleaze. If you told one your most trusted friends that you made out with so-and-so that last night, it would take a maximum of one minute for everyone in the place to know all about it.

That's why it was so important for the Mess Hall to be empty when we got there, which it was not. There wasn't exactly that many people inside, but the coffee line was stretched to fifteen people. And some hungover Dionysus kid was hitting the wrong buttons on the machine at the front of it.

"This is complete and utter _poo," _I huffed.

Victoria Draper turned around in front of me and rolled her heavily mascara-ed eyes. "Poo, Nico?"

"Poo, Tori."

"_Vict_oria."

"I can't deal with this so early in the morning," I scowled.

Victoria was this Nike gal who thought she was an Aphrodite gal instead. "Did you hear about, like, Van?"

"Like I, like, need to know anything about him," I mocked her.

She flicked me off. "Yeah, my sources tell me that he stumbled off into his cabin at like _midnight."_

"So what?"

"People say that he, like, hooked up with the _new girl."_

"Okay . . . ."

"Show more interest! I mean you're dating Roxy and all, but I think you and the, like, new girl have so so much more chemistry!"

"I am NOT dating Roxy!" I mean, why was everyone assuming that these days?

By the time I got my coffee, Cres was sitting at the Hades portion of Table #2 with a semi interested look on her face. When I sat down, she began ticking off her fingers. "Apparently 1) I lost my virginity to Van Ryon and I'm now pregnant with his baby twins. 2) We're getting eloped in Vegas next week. 3) You're having an affair with me over some girl called Roxy Alfred. And 4) Laken Abbington, the daughter of the snow goddess can't actually make snow."

I cracked up. "Nice. So Van didn't actually rape you?"

"Why would Van rape me?" she said, taking a bite out of a hash brown.

"I don't know, Cres, he seems like the kinda guy would go over a new girl's house and rape her."

"Well, I would say you're about the same."

"What?!" I spat out coffee into her face. If someone else had compared me with The Vehicle, I would have stabbed the person!

"EW! GROSS, Nico!" she cried, mopping up her coffee splattered face with a napkin. "I guess you wouldn't be that type, you seem more like the guy would come over to a new girl's house and rape her kitty instead."

"WHAT?!" A kitty?! You've got to be freakin' kidding me. Cres Fallen was a crazy woman.

She smirked. "Sorry," she said, looking not sorry at all. "That was totally uncalled for. Uh-oh, who's all those girls?"

"What?" I said for the third time in a row, and stared around. Cres was right. There were like ten girls gaping at me like I was a chunk of juicy meant.

"I think – you should have worn a shirt," Cres whispered smugly.

"Shut up. Oh, look, it's my gang. I have to introduce them to you!"

Roxy, James, and Shoots were making their way towards our table, all in their pajamas. Like me. They raised their eyebrows at Cres and Roxy tilted her head and smirked. What was her _problem?_

When it came down to introducing Shoots, Cres raised her own eyebrow.

"It's a nickname," I said. "His last name is Barrel, and he loves first shooter video games."

"Then shouldn't you be called 'Gun'?"

Shoots grinned. "Too proactive, according to my school principal."

Cres and I exchanged looks; with everyone there, deciphering her dream would have to be delayed for now.

"When do the sessions start today?" I asked James, who basically knew everything.

"10:30, like always."

"Sessions?" Cres asked.

"Yeah, sessions are one hour and a half periods of activities that you do here in camp. On weekdays, you do four sessions, starting from 9:00, on Saturdays you do three sessions starting from 10:30, like today, and on Sundays you don't have sessions at all. Sessions include everything from Swordfighting, Chariot Racing, and Rock Climbing," I explained.

"Nico's only naming his favorite sessions. I like Archery, Arts and Crafts, Pegasus Riding and Dramatics, on the other hand," Roxy said with one of her signature eyerolls.

Shoots added, "Besides that, there are all sorts of stuff like Canoe Racing, Swimming, Defensive, Offensive, and Specialized Training sessions. We even have Greek Cooking."

"What's Specialized Training?"

"It's like training for the special traits you got from your god parents – the traits that no one else has. Like when me and Roxy do Spesh, we train our wind skills with each other," James said.

Cres looked miffed. "Is this camp like those other camps that there's a codeword for everything? Spesh for Specialized Training? What else?"

"Well there's Riot, for Chariot Racing, and you pronounce it like the mob protests, not Ree-ot, but Rye-ot. Canoe Racing is Noonoo. Some of the Aphrodite kids call Swordfighting The Art of Disgust and Sweat, or TADS, but no one else calls it that. Dramatics is called Queens, 'cuz they're all drama queens. Arts and Crafts is just called Pinky."

Cres burst out laughing. "_Pinky? _Is that a sexist comment?"

"Ah, no," Shoots said in a regrettable tone. "This dude called Pinky loved Arts and Crafts so much, we named the session after him when he died."

"When he _died?"_

"He got killed by a monster."

"Ah."

Yeah, I wasn't sure if Cres realized how dangerous it was to be a half blood these days. "So what session do you want to do first?" I asked Cres. "Chiron put me in charge to show you around and introduce you to the camp schedule. We'll be doing the same sessions for about a week."

"Um, Swordfighting first. Then Rock Climbing, and Pegasus Riding."

I looked at my watch. "And I think we should get going. Anyone doing Swordfighting with us?"

They shook their heads, planning to do Spesh first thing before lunch.

"Alright, Cres, so there's three arenas in total. They're simply called A1, A2, and A3. A1 primarily focuses on Swordfighting, A2 on Wrestling, and A3 is used for excess kids who choose the session Swordfighting," I explained as we left the Mess Hall.

"There's the climbing wall," I said, pointing at the frightening structure. "The lava adds to the challenge."

"Huh. When I chose Rock Climbing as a session today, I didn't realize my potential death was near."

"Dramatic. You sure you're not a Queens-er instead?"

"Drama? I don't do drama!" she laughed offhandedly. Her face had suddenly turned stony and I realized a bit too late that I had made a slight reference to her mother and father's acting tendencies.

I know she had a reason to be upset, but c'mon, wasn't she being kind of overly sensitive?

We had arrived at A1, and there was practically no one there because everyone else wanted to do something less sweaty first thing in the morning. I waved hi to some of the guys I knew and led Cres to the back of the arena. "To make this more interesting, we're gonna use real swords with dull blades."

There was a bunch of training swords stored for beginners and training. They were all different lengths and weights, and divided by the material they were made of. I totally disregarded the bamboo, wooden, reinforced rubber plastic swords, and iron weight training, and went right to the steel. Steel was a bit lighter and weighted better for beginners than celestial bronze, and camp hardly made any spares. Once a camper was ready, they signed up for a three session program just on Blacksmithing, where they made their own celestial bronze swords.

I laid a few swords out on the table which I thought would be good for Cres's small size but surprisingly strong arms.

"Are these for me?"

"You sound like a freakin' five year old, Fallen. Pick one up, feel the weight, and choose one that seems most comfortable to you."

"Ok, ok," she said, picking up one sword at a time. She shook her head in irritancy over the shorter swords, and finally settled on a longer sword. The blade width was a bit wide, maybe three and a half inches, but it tapered off at a sharp point.

"You're not going to use Styggie, are you?" she asked, worried.

"Nah, I'm using this." I hefted a huge, six inch wide iron blade and watched Cres's eyes widen in shock.

"I'm gonna pee in my pants here, di Angelo! You're not going to use _that,_ right?"

I laughed, and grabbed another sword. It was slightly shorter than Cres's, and thinner too, but I could sense a base of strengthened alloy in the middle of the blade. It would do good against Cres's sword. I began, "Ok, I know you'll probably say that you're not scared of these swords, but you probably are."

"I am _not!"_ Cres exclaimed.

Without any warning, I took a swing at her, bending my elbow at the last second so my sword would stop a millimeter away from her nose, rather than chopping off her head. Cres had no time to react and stared at me in utter horror.

"You could have killed me!" she breathed, her eyes looking crazed.

"Yeah, well, are you scared or not? Swords are weapons, Cres. They could hurt you."

"Alright, I am scared," she said.

"Good." I took her sword from her hand and ran my finger hard on the edge. "Right now, you don't need to be that concerned to avoid the blade of a sword. These swords are magically dulled and the tips are blunted. See? No blood." I held up my finger to show her. "Here, you try."

She carefully put her fingers over the sword and slid them down the blade. "Wow, that's kinda weird."

"But it's not like these are totally painless. They still leave plenty of bruises and if I wasn't such a good fencer, tomorrow you would look as purple as your favorite dinosaur."

"Jeez, jerk Nico is back! I wonder where your ego went."

I sang a few lines of Ego by Beyonce under my breath. Did I mention that Kanye West looked like he was dunked in lip gloss in the music video?

"Shut it, di Angelo. You can't sing for shit. When do we start?"

I showed her how to grip the sword properly and explained what was going to happen. "I'm not the kind of teacher that teaches you one individual move at a time and asks you to work on it. We're half-bloods, not sport fencers in the Olympics. You should try to develop your own style and not use predictable moves that you might get from repetitive practice. I'm gonna attack you and you're gonna defend yourself. If I see that you're using a good technique or stance that you came by naturally, I'll stop and explain it. Got it?"

"Yeah," Cres said.

"Ok then." I made a few lunges to her torso and Cres twisted her body to avoid them.

"What you're doing right now is called disengaging. That's when you avoid my blade without touching it with yours. It's a good technique, but I think you're forgetting that you have a sword of your own in your hand, Cres."

I paused as she looked down at it with a frown. "Is it strange if I say I totally forgot about it?"

"Not really. You're looking at my sword like it's gonna kill you, so your first priority is to not let your body get harmed and you're not thinking about your own weapon. A lot of people think like you, but it's a good thing they all got the first skill on how to disengage." I continued to attack her and she jumped away but brought up her sword.

Our swords clanged and I grinned. "You learn fast, young grasshopper. That was called a parry. It's when you block off an attack."

Cres snorted. "Do you have to call me a grasshopper, Sifu?"

"Oh, yah." I lunged again and she parried my blade away. I let her practice her parry for a while before telling her to start acting offensive.

She frowned concernedly as she did an experimental attack quickly after a parry.

"Be more confident, Fallen! And that was called a riposte, an attack after a parry. It's also a kind of lunge, which is just the sort of jabbing and sometimes slashing attack I've been doing for a while now."

Once she had pretty much gotten a solid foundation on how to lunge (even though she wasn't that great about it yet), I increased my attacks. "This is what I call Half-Blood Non Standard Fighting, or NSF. I'm moving away from modern sport fencing designated moves and etiquette to something we half-bloods do all the time, just swinging and slashing to keep ourselves alive and our monster opponent not. Trust your instincts when I'm attacking you and attack back when you see a chance," I told Cres.

Cres's teeth were gritted as I repetitively swung my blade out hard to her and her sword slowed as she got more tired. I landed a few minor touches that could have been full blown blows if I hadn't controlled my stroke in time. She parried and feinted with determined movements, but she was quickly weakening when I pulled up.

"I think that's enough for today. NSF is brutal," I said, and my mouth widened into a grin when she stood her ground, scowling.

"I'm not tired, you think I'm tired?"

"C'mon, Cres, I could knock you down with my finger."

"Try it!"

I leaned forward and poked her.

She collapsed and I smirked. "Told you."

I thought she pretty much died on the floor when she yanked on my ankle and I fell to the ground beside her.

"Owwww," I groaned.

We lay on the floor staring at the ceiling, panting for breath. _"Forget _that training program my mom signed me up for once! NSF is crazy! I think I lost a million calories!" Cres said with a tired little laugh.

I rolled over onto my stomach and propped up my face with my elbows, looking at her.

"What?" she said, her face blushing red.

"Do girls only just think about losing calories?" I smirked.

"No! I mean I think I did pretty well today! Didn't you think I did well?"

"You did a lot better than I expected you would," I nodded grudgingly. "I think you discovered all the basic moves in ten minutes less than average, and you lasted way over the five minute average most people can handle NSF."

"See? I'm a natural."

Invincibility Woman. That nickname just got better and better.

"You're gonna be plenty sore tomorrow, though. I'm looking forward to that."

Cres rolled her eyes. "When's lunch?"

* * *

**A/N: I LIED. We will finally have a nice long chat with Cres next chapter. I lied to you again. My promises cannot be kept. I HOPE that next chapter the actual plot will come in (it was just amazingly fun to write two half-bloods swordfighting!). REVIEW!!! and have a nice 2010 XD**


	7. Nightly Encounters of a Strange Kind

**A/N: Couldn't bring myself to finish writing this one - but now I guess I finished it. Thank the gods. Dedicated to my annoying little friend who wouldn't stop bugging me to finish this chapter.**

Arrow of the Fallen - Chapter Seven: Nightly Encounters of a Strange Kind

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"Guess what, Nico! Rachel Dare has arrived in camp!" Victoria gushed over her healthy, vegetarian salad.

"That's great. And why do I care?" I said over my high calorie, meaty, barbeque-sauce-drenched rack of ribs.

"She can obviously tell us something about the Next Great Prophecy," said Shoots over his fried fish and potato wedges.

It was already dinner time and Vicks, Shoots, and I were all sitting in our usual places on the assigned Table #2. The whole camp was buzzing about how our Oracle of Delphi had already come to camp. The last few years she had only shown up for a week in late June to belch out quest prophecies and then left for vacation. And right now was early June. This was way earlier than normal.

Though Vickie and the others hadn't really thought about one little thing: it was just a rumor right now. "Either Chiron's hiding her away, or she didn't come at all and you're just jumping to conclusions," I said, ripping into the flesh of another rib.

Victoria averted her eyes. "You're disgusting."

"I have to say that Vickie's right." Shoots passed me a napkin and I waved it away.

"I'm a man. I don't do napkins."

Victoria and Shoots shook their heads as one. "Are you usually such an idiot?" Vicks asked.

"Why are you even talking to me?" I complained. "Talk to your Nike half-siblings instead."

We all looked at Andrew Goeser, the Nike cabin leader. He was texting furiously on his cell phone, a potato wedge sticking out of his mouth. Loranda and Paul, the other two Nike half-bloods, were cracking up from an inside joke.

"See?" Victoria whispered. "Loranda and Paul are like, twelve and seven years old and Andy's busy, so what can I do but like, hang out with you guys?"

I sighed and looked over at Table #3, where Cres had apparently became best friends with Roxy, Laken, and Sorcha Bower from the Iris cabin.

"I see you looking at her," Vickie grinned widely. "You _like _her."

I was about to say 'shut up' when I got a massive thump on the head from someone behind me. My head nearly hit the table before I caught myself.

"Aww, look it's Nico di Angelo!"

"Rachel?"

Just one look at Victoria and Shoots' gaping faces knew I was right on the guess.

I sighed and looked around. Rachel Dare was ready for me, yanking on my cheeks and stretching them out like I was a five year old. "Aren't you a cutie, now?"

"I'm – fifteen – years – old – get – AWAY!" I forced her hands off my face and my skin snapped back onto my cheeks painfully. "Ow."

"You've grown so much!" declared Rachel ruffling my hair. "Seriously, Annabeth, hasn't he grown so much?"

The two eighteen year olds giggled down at me and I wanted to scream. Victoria was laughing herself and Shoots was openly smirking. "What do you want?" I snarled nastily at her. Rachel was now really tall, with extremely curly red hair, paint splattered jeans, graffitied Converse, and dressed in a T-shirt that was obviously the product of some ripping, slashing, and knotting.

"I just came to camp to – oh, SNAP!"

"Rachel?"

"She's having a prophecy!" Annabeth gasped.

What?

I jumped up from the table and went to help Annabeth steady Rachel until she could stand on her own. Her mouth opened and clouds of green stuff poured out of her mouth, the inspiration for Rachel's nickname: Barf Bag. Green swirled everywhere and when Rachel opened her mouth, it was triple her voice.

"_Seven half-bloods will answer the call._

_To storm or fire, the world must fall._

_An oath to keep with a final breath,_

_And foes bear arms to the Doors of Death._"

Her mouth closed in almost a smile and the green stopped coming out of her mouth. Her eyes dimmed to their usual color, not the scary snakey green.

"Wait a sec . . ."

"That was the same prophecy she said three years ago!" Annabeth wailed.

Annabeth looked like she was punched in the face and I expected I looked the same. "Has an Oracle ever said a prophecy twice?"

"How should I know?"

Rachel was waking up from her ordeal and shook herself. As usual, she looked like she had never said a prophecy in the first place and seemed normal as ever. She saw the grumpy faces on me and Annabeth and asked, "What happened?"

"We thought you might prophesising some _new _prophecy for a quest or something, but instead you just told the old 'seven half-bloods will answer the call' one."

"What? I've never said a prophecy twice!" Rachel yelled, amazed. "Even if there was a three year gap in between when I said before and now!"

"That's what she said," I deadpanned.

Shoots got massively excited. "That means that the prophecy does concern someone of the current generation!"

Did I tell you that when Shoots gets excited, he uses strange James-like terms? Oh, great, I'm doing it too. Kinda. Who uses the word "terms" these days?

"Scoot that way, Goeser," Rachel practically growled at Andrew.

After Andrew quickly scurried down the table, Rachel plunked herself down and grabbed a breadstick. "Do you know how _weird _it's been the last few days? I was afraid to go to school because I kept thinking I would collapse with a prophecy. The dreams were just pouring on and on so I couldn't sleep at all either," Rachel started.

"What kind of dreams?" Annabeth asked.

"There was a man with brown hair, and two teenagers with the same brown hair but no highlights, and the boy had a scar that came down his face."

"The Fallen," I breathed. They were everywhere. "Did they talk to you?"

"No. The who?" said Rachel.

They all looked at me and I fidgeted uncomfortably. Even Andrew stopped his nonstop texting to listen in.

"Um, yeah, I could maybe tell Rachel, but for the rest of you, sorry."

"Nico!" Vickie complained loudly.

"Look, you can ask Chiron all about it, okay? This isn't my choice."

"Maybe I _will_ ask Chiron," Annabeth said.

* * *

Still in the end, there was no more time to talk to Cres about whatever her blood came from. I was so exhausted from the whole day I fell asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow. Thankfully, neither Shoots, Roxy, or James camped out in my cabin and I could sleep at a normal hour.

Again I had a weird dream. I really don't know what's been going on in my head lately.

_I was walking through a forest of tall dandelions. Like I was small, and they were big. Three stories tall by the looks of it. They were all around me, swaying in some super strong wind you wouldn't believe. There were three figures in the distance. As I got closer, I slapped my hand to my forehead. Of course. It was the Fallen triplets._

"_Hey, Mitch, Rhys, Kat," I said with false happiness and casualty. I was actually wringing my hands together and my teeth were gritted. I didn't care if Cres's father was one of them, I didn't trust them at all._

_They all answered in a reflection of their different characters. "Hey there, Nico," said Mitchell. "Hello," said Rhys. "Hey, Nic," said Katrina._

_Katrina turned deliberately in my direction and made such a slow, sly wink, I felt uncomfortable. She and Rhys looked eighteen, but Mitchell still looked a lot older than them._

"_What's up, guys?" I asked. Man, I was good at this casual thing._

_When Katrina rolled her eyes, she looked exactly like Cres. "Nothin' much. You?"_

"_Well since you were the guys who made me have all these creepy dreams, I was hoping you would tell me why you're suddenly showing up," I said, exasperated._

"_It's something that has to do with the Arrow of the Fallen." She laughed. "My little nickname for someone special."_

"_That's great, Trina," Mitch smiled. "Just like your Blood of the Fallen."_

"_Yeah, what _you_ call Arrow Ichor, which in my opinion is some lameass name for something as simple as the Blood of the Fallen," Rhys spoke in his quiet way._

"_Rhys! Language!" Katrina said._

"_I can definitely handle the 'L' word," I said drily. "And what does this have to do with you guys showing up in my dreams? I can't understand a word you guys are talking about. Arrow of the Fallen? Blood of the Fallen?"_

"_Never mind!" the triplets said together. Katrina and Mitchell exchanged glances and grinned, but Rhys still looked sullen. "We're here to lead you to a special meeting place, come!"_

"_I don't have any other choice do I?"_

_I followed them through the forest of gigantic dandelions and out to a circular pond. "Look into the waters, Nico," said Rhys. "The call of the quest is here."_

"_The call of the quest?"_

And then I woke up. Darn it.

"Nico?"

"Cres?"

My eyes squinted in the bright light and readjusted. Somehow I had sleepwalked all the way to the Great Hall. In the dead center of the place, seven half-bloods including me were somehow standing in a perfect circle.

Cres Fallen. Roxy and James Alfred. Shoots Barrel, Victoria Draper, and Van Ryon. All together we made seven.

"Seven half-bloods will answer the call," James said softly. "I wonder how they made us sleepwalk in a dream."

James took it so calmly compared to the rest of us.

"What the hell am I doing here?" said Van. He looked horrified, staring at his hands like they were the ones who made him do something so utterly humiliating called sleepwalking. He also refused to meet Roxy's eyes.

"What is _he _doing here?" said Roxy. She stabbed a manicured finger in Van's direction.

"How did we all sleepwalk and make a perfect circle?" said Shoots, staring with wonder around him.

"Why am I, like, sleepwalking?" said Vicks. She looked totally out of her element, blinking at the torch light of the Great Hall at night time in a flimsy nightgown.

Cres and I looked at each other. "Suppose we call Chiron, Percy, and the others, and spill the whole story?" she suggested. I nodded and went to call them. Cres raised her eyebrows a little at that, but we're living in the twenty first century and everybody owns a cell phone.

Chiron arrived a little after two minutes later with Percy, Annabeth, and Rachel in tow. "What are you all doing down here?" Chiron asked. "I was only expecting Nico and Cres."

"We're the seven from the new prophecy," James said bluntly.

We all looked at him. "Are you still asleep, Alfred?" Van said, which was what we all were thinking. Somehow, the sluggish way James was acting and his quick readiness to accept the fact that we were part of the prophecy summed up how James could still be dreaming in Dreamland.

"Forget my brother, and let's get down to business, 'cuz I don't know about you guys, but I'm dead tired," Roxy snapped her fingers.

"Sure," said Cres. "Last night, the goddess Styx visited me in a dream. She told me about a mortal she fell in love with – and had a half-blood baby named Seth Fallen."

"Your grandfather," said Chrion. "Go on."

"Seth Fallen never went to Camp Half-blood, but he trained himself how to kill monsters. He was remarkably handsome, said Styx, and Eos fell in love with him. Eos always falls in love with young, handsome men, apparently. Seth and Eos had the Fallen triplets: Mitchell, Rhys, and Katrina. Mitchell knocked up my mother, Shannon Pike, and had me."

"Yeah, and she gets Artemis blood because her mom was blessed by Artemis," I finished.

"Wait a sec. Shannon Pike is your mother?" Shoots asked with an almost funny incredulous look on his face.

"That's hardly the point." Cres sighed.

Annabeth yawned hugely after we explained our sleepwalking dreams. We all had the same dream: walking through dandelion forests and meeting the Fallen triplets. We all ended up in the Mess Hall, standing in a perfect circle. None of us remembered feeling grass under our bare feet or whatnot. That meant all seven of us ending up in the camp's cafeteria at two o'clock in the morning meant that we had 'answered the call.' So what was next?

"To storm or fire the world must fall. Anyone know what _that _means?" said Annabeth.

I thought all the way back to my first dream that starred those stupid little relatives of Cres's. "Rhys mentioned to me last last night that he thought he was storm and his brother was fire. He didn't explain what it meant, though."

"I guess there's nothing else to do then but to wait," Rachel nodded.

"And get some sleep," Van said bluntly.

Roxy nodded in actual approval in Van's direction.

* * *

**A/N: I'll be in Shanghai for a while, so don't expect quick updates. You CAN expect a chapter extremely more exciting than this boring one. Review? Please? It makes me feel special. And if you review something really cool (either negative or positive comments), I'll reply to you. And then you'll feel special too. :D**


	8. The Battle of Pizza Hut

**A/N: Longest chapter ever I think. A reward for such a late update. **

Arrow of the Fallen - Chapter Eight: The Battle of Pizza Hut

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"I think you guys should go on a road trip," said Annabeth right when I sat down with the whole gang the next morning.

Vickie's eyes widened. "On a road trip? Why?"

"Since the prophecy doesn't tell you anything about where you should go, I don't think you should follow the quest. Let the quest follow you. You won't accomplish anything by just waiting around for something to happen. You've got to go to L.A," Annabeth explained.

This was all so random and confusing for me. "So we have to drive there and not just take a plane?"

"No, idiot, do you know how dangerous it is for a half-blood that's not a kid of Zeus to be on a plane?" Van smiled moronically.

No, idiot, why don't you shut your piehole?

"It's what Van says," Annabeth nodded. "You don't know what could happen on a plane without someone like Zeus's protection. Monsters could sneak on and attack you and you would be dead."

"So you think in L.A. we can meet up with my dad?" Cres frowned.

"Not only your dad but your aunt and uncle. I have a feeling they've just escaped one very special hotel not so long ago."

"A hotel?"

"The Lotus Casino and Resort in Las Vegas. They couldn't have traveled far." I remembered how the twins looked so much younger than Mitchell. Annabeth's idea was a probable one. It was just like how did they get into the Lotus Casino in the first place? Who got them out?

"Who's gonna drive us?"

Annabeth looked at Shoots.

"No way!" Shoots cried. "I'm the only person who's driving age around here?"

"Hey, don't worry, Shootie. When we're driving somewhere isolated I'll trade off with you," said Roxy.

"Yeah right," Van said. "You'd probably crash the car."

"Did I _ask_ you? Stuff it!"

"On another note," continued Annabeth with a slightly irritated look, "Cres still needs to have a bit more half-blood training."

"And a sword," I added, ruffling Cres's hair. She shook me off and dunked my hand into a glass of orange juice.

"What is your _problem,_ Fallen?"

"I don't care if I'm a new half-blood but I don't like you treating me like I'm a child," she hissed before stomping away with Roxy and Vicks in tow.

Shoots wolf whistled under his breath. "What the heck did you do, di Angelo, for her to get all pissed like that?"

Annabeth helped me mop up the orange juice trickling down her arm. "Be nice to her, Nico," she whispered to me. "She's under a lot of pressure, and you do have to train her too."

"It's not like she's a freakin' saint, you know," I scowled.

"Will you quit being an a-hole for just a little while?" Van snarled.

Annabeth closed her eyes and sighed.

* * *

"She's making her sword without me?"

"She doesn't really like you right now, Nic."

"Still, that's kinda a freakin' overreaction. I was the one who taught her all about NSF."

"Nico . . ."

"Yeah. What."

"Go get me some celestial bronze bullets from the forges will you?"

"Roxy!" I glared accusingly at her. "This is such a set up. You're not even trying to cover how set uppy it is."

"This is not 'set uppy'," Roxy growled. "I need machine gun ammunition and a few slugs _for real."_

She picked up her ammunition belts and vests and waved them around so I could see how empty the compartments were.

I growled. "Fine. Shoots, you need anything? James? Victoria?"

Roxy specialized in celestial bronze guns. She had about two hand guns, one light machine gun, and a rifle that all fired modified bullets that could kill monsters. Her twin on the other hand favored daggers or close range hand to hand combat. He used his wind powers to boost his speed until you could hardly see him sometimes, and some specific slices and dices placed on the right areas could bring down several monsters in a row. Shoots played his Apollo skills and could shoot an arrow almost as fast as one of Roxy's bullets. But he shot such heavy duty arrows that monsters were killed with one arrow rather than a round of fire and a few nine millimeter slugs.

I have no idea what Victoria specialized in. Killer make up?

"Get some more Shoots Barrel Trademarked arrows off the molds! I put some molten bronze in them before breakfast. I think there's like thirty arrows cooling. Oh and ask Jake Mason for the special arrowheads he developed recently. Ask him what kind of string I need for this summer," Shoots yelled from the bathroom.

"I don't need anything except for a new light, portable blade sharpener!" James called. "And a few knuckle-dusters with spikes and stuff! All celestial bronze!"

"Don't need anything!" Victoria shouted. "I'll stop by the Dionysus and Demeter kids later! There's, like, some poisons I want to brew."

I was about to step out of the door of my own cabin when Roxy demanded one last time, "FLECHETTES! Get me flechettes!"

Gods. "How many?"

"Just take whatever Jake gives you! He knows how much I usually use!" she said. "Okay bye!"

I put on flip flops and Ray-Ban sunglasses that practically matched the Aviator decked out skeletons that attacked me a few days ago. I looked like the epitome of cool, I admit. Black band tee, flames on black print board shorts (you never know when you're gonna dive into the ocean these days), flip flops, sunglasses, and _bling._ Actually no bling. It just sounded kind of awesome following that list of words.

The walk to the forges was pleasant. I kept on cracking my knuckles, ready to punch the lights out of Cres Fallen if she dared to dip my hand into something slightly more toxic, like molten iron for example. The girl had to learn some self-control. And she's done enough painful things to me that I don't care if she's a girl. I'll use force with her anytime now.

"Nico di Angelo! How's it going?"

"Dude, it's Jake!"

We did one of those handshake things – bump, bump, slide, break the pickle etc. etc. Jake Mason was the Head Counselor of the forges, seventeen, with dark curly hair and a good sense of humor.

"That girl of yours has an eye for swords," Jake grinned.

"She's not my girl, and for the hundredth time, I don't really care about her," I groaned.

"So why are you here?"

"Weapons. Me and several others are going on a quest." I gave him the full order and he grimaced at Shoots's demand.

"One batch of those SB Trademarked arrows takes such a long time to cool, and Dionysus threatened me if I bought that kind of metal again he would fire me from Blacksmithing Head Counselor. I risked like everything to put an order in to the Stoll brothers to buy me more of that metal. It's called Apollo's blessing, and it's really expensive," Jake complained.

"Apollo's blessing?"

"It's like fifty bucks for a pound of that metal. Really expensive, like I said. All the Apollo kids want some of it, but usually they don't care if I make the metal in their arrows a seventy-five percent celestial bronze, ten percent aluminum, and fifteen percent Apollo's blessing alloy. But Shoots Barrel, he just _has_ to have arrows made completely of Apollo's blessing. I only promise those kinds of arrows for Will Solace, and he's the cabin leader, for gods' sakes."

He hurried around the weaponry area of the forges, grabbing bullets and ammo for Roxy, knuckle dusters and a blade sharpener for James, and also laid down a box of flechettes into my arms. Flechettes were small, pointed, almost arrow like projectiles that you could put into some guns instead of bullets. Our camp flechettes were naturally made out of celestial bronze, just like the bullets. After dumping bowstrings into my arms, too, Jake finally motioned me to follow him back to the actual forges so he could pick up all of Shoots' precious arrows.

It was scorching hot and stuffy.

All the ovens were up full blast, black dust settled on everybody, and a couple of twelve year olds were hammering into some molds and pouring metal into pots. A huge deposit of metals clumped in a pile on the ground; most of it being celestial bronze – one of the only metals that could kill Greek monsters.

"I'm guessing you still haven't figured out how to work with Stygian iron?" I smirked at Jake.

"Dude, I can't even _touch _the metal without it searing my hand right off, and when you burn it, it either shatters or refuses to be melted down. I wish I had some kind of Hades blood! Or maybe _you _should work in the forges."

"Never!" I laughed hard until I saw Cres Fallen glaring at me from behind a table. She looked like some kind of freakin' goddess. Her body glistened with sweat and her hair was casually tossed into a bun. She was also wearing a bikini top and tiny shorts, long legs shining and arm muscles nicely defined.

Like whoa!

"You look like a perv, Nico," whispered Jake. "Tone down the jaw dropping and eye bulging."

"Like what you see, di Angelo?" she said flatly.

"Ye – no," I said quickly.

"Yeah, right." And then I realized that she wasn't talking about her body – of course she wasn't – but the sword that was propped up on the table. It was still in the mold and looked gorgeous. The bronze glistened like gold and an intricate pattern was carved into the blade. I walked closer and I saw that the design was of feathers, water droplets, and curling ribbons like flexible rays of sun.

"Did you carve that?" I gasped at Cres.

"That she did," Jake nodded. "Friggin' amazing."

"Thanks, Jake," said Cres. "Yeah, he said that I just have to wait another hour and then I'll be ready to go on the road trip as planned."

"Wonderful," I said.

"It better be."

Jake hurried away. "Awkwardsauce," he grinned.

* * *

We hit the road at three in the afternoon. Chiron, Rachel, Annabeth, my little mini-me Dylan, and a few other half-bloods tearily bade us goodbye, but Dionysus and Percy just smiled and waved. To be specific, Dionysus didn't even wave and his grin was really nasty. Packing went smoothly for everyone except for Victoria and Van, no surprises there. Shoots stared at three pairs of boot longingly before taking them all. I was just like, "whatever, let's just throw all the black and silver clothes I have into my suitcase," and I was done. Camp Half-Blood gave us one of the camp minivans to drive since all seven of us couldn't exactly fit into a regular car.

After three hours of driving on the highway, we all needed dinner to eat. We passed by three rest stops that had crappy food until Vickie pointed out that we should just take an exit with Pizza Hut signs on it and follow the directions. I agreed.

"Pizza Hut that way," James directed. "TURN! TURN! GO INTO THE PARKING LOT!"

"DUDE!" Shoots jerked the wheel and several of us went thudding into the van walls.

"Ow."

"Tell me faster next time you want me to turn!" said Shoots angrily as pedestrians dove out of the way.

Suddenly, three shapes came barreling my way and out the door onto the sidewalk. "FOOD!" shouted Cres, Roxy, and Victoria as one.

"You chicks have bigger appetites than teenage boys like us are supposed to have," I shook my head as the girls ran into the signature shaped red building. "Tell the waitress to set a table for seven!"

Once Shoots parked the van, we walked calmly towards the Pizza Hut, talking manly and casually unlike the girls before us. A group of punked out cheerleaders smoking in the parking lot winked and smirked at us. "And four hot guys step out of a van! I would hit _that!"_

"All parts of me are taken," Van drawled as we strode into the restaurant.

Inside I burst out laughing. "We're traveling in a van and your name is Van!" I giggled. "Call me lame, but that's amazing!"

The pizza tasted heavenly since we were all worn out. The waitresses loved coming around our table because of Van, Shoots, and I chatting them up. We tried to coax James into doing it too, but he insisted that he won't flirt with anybody if he already had a girlfriend back in Connecticut. The Vehicle scoffed at that but we told him that this was what non-idiots did.

"Hey," I said to a passing waitress. "Beatrice? Could we have our check, please?" The waitress turned around, smiled at me, and then left to get it. I relaxed back into the booth, my eyes following her curvy, petite figure which was accentuated in red and black fabric. Waitresses are the love.

Then the floor started rattling, the lights in the restaurant flickering chaotically. "Holy shit. It's a freakin' earthquake in South Jersey," Shoots gasped, gripping the table.

I watched Beatrice, the other wait staff, and fifteen or so customers shriek loudly in surprise and fear. Then I raised my face and sniffed the air. I know, I probably looked like a retard. "This ain't an earthquake. I smell monster."

_Boom._ Beatrice was gone. I wasn't sure if she had fallen quickly to the ground or something had blown her down or what.

"Beatrice?"

"For gods' sakes, _get down, _Nico!" screamed Roxy, knocking me down into the booth.

All of us had gotten under the table in a split second. We had hands on all our weapons, but only Roxy had pulled out one of her handguns and James his daggers because if the rest of us drew our swords, we would most likely slice each other in half rather than the enemy in the cramped space.

"What the hell is it?" Shoots hissed. "Can anyone see anything?"

"I'll climb low and look out," Vickie said.

"Vicks!" Shoots said but she had already disappeared from underneath the table.

"What is she _doing?_ Does she even have a weapon?" Van asked, with a very uncharacteristic mortified tone.

"Of course she has a weapon!" said Shoots. But he didn't seem so sure.

"You guys, she's the daughter of Victory. She'll be fine."

Roxy was right. Victoria wiggled back under the table after a few seconds. "It's, like, the weirdest thing ever," she panted. "Some group of skeletons is throwing fireballs at these weird seaweed spaghetti creatures. I don't know what to make of it."

"James. You think we should wait their war out or join the fight?" I asked the smartest person there.

"Join the fight. They're obviously Greek, somehow."

"You heard him. Let's attack those losers. Cres, you stay down here."

"No way, Van Ryon, those are my father's skeletons, I bet. And last time we met those skeletons, Nico and Percy and Chiron would have died if I wasn't there. So you can either stick it or I'll stick you with my sword."

"Dude, Cres, what the hell," Van snarled. "Are you freakin' kidding me?"

"SHUT UP!" I yelled as quietly as I could. "It's not safe under the table anyway and we have to save all the mortals we can, _and _get the heck out of New Jersey. So move it."

"You can't order me around," he said but Van moved anyway.

We poured out under the table and the first thing I saw was a bunch of mortals that looked asleep on the ground. Then I saw these monstrous things oozing around the Pizza Hut floor and swallowing fireballs in their mouths.

"Holy," announced James. "What are those?"

Then of course these things had to speak. _"We are the poxules,"_ they said in grating voices. _"We live for Rhys Fallen."_

Okay, let me tell you how weird it was for them to speak. They were like giant lumps of jelly but lightning seemed to crackle within. Each one stood seven feet tall and all of them smelled like they were charged with electricity. Wind billowed everywhere, knocking pizzas and Cokes off tables. James and Roxy looked devoted to controlling their own wind so the 'poxules' wouldn't blow us all off balance.

So they looked like gigantic mounds of _storm._ "Check. Storm for Rhys."

"That's great, Nico, but will they hurt us?" asked Cres.

"_We won't hurt you. It's those skeletons that we are ordered to kill."_

It was almost comical on how fast we whirled around to face the skeletons on the other side of the Pizza Hut. They looked ten times more scary than when Cres and I first saw them from the gorge. This time their whole bodies were encased in red flame. Aviators still framed their faces and the pendant was also not on fire.

"Check. Fire for Mitchell."

"Why are those idiots fighting each other over a Pizza Hut?" Cres groaned.

"I don't think their fighting over the pizzas," said James. "They obviously want something, and we have to get out of here before all hell breaks loose."

"Then let's run now!" Rox shouted and we all dashed for the exit.

Mortals lay unconscious around us, their bodies getting swept by the immense wind from the poxules. I had no idea what happened to them, but I decided that they were fine and kept running. The Pizza Hut seemed a lot bigger now than before, especially with booths blocking your every way.

"Roxy! Skeleton at ten o'clock!" I yelled at her.

"_Mother of Zeus!"_ she screamed, not seeing the skeleton until I told her. Roxy's reflexes were fast, though. She shot through the skeleton at point blank range and it fell over in a flaming pile of bones.

Suddenly Van was there beside her. "Are you alright?" he asked, calming her shaking hand with his.

"Of course I'm _alright, _dumbass!"

I wanted to laugh, but I was kind of concerned for her myself. She hadn't been on a real quest with real monsters for some two years. "Go, you guys! That skeleton isn't dead, and it's regenerating!"

By then, twenty strong skeletons were hacking at us. I screamed warnings to everybody while trying to take my own skeletons off my back. The poxules had decided to defend only Cres so she was yelling at them.

"Why don't you fight for my friends too, idiots?"

"_We only need to keep you alive, young master, Arrow of the Fallen."_

"Well if you want to keep _me _alive keep my friends alive too!"

The lead poxule did a shaking movement like a shake of a head. _"And even then we only need your blood."_

"Well, eff that, I'm not giving you any of my blood!"

"_Then we have no choice but to take you by force, Crescent Fallen."_

"No! Cres!" I yelped at her as the poxules and skeletons all turned on her. There was nothing I could do. I couldn't get there in time. No one there was close enough to help her either. I swear she was going to die. But my Hades instincts said otherwise.

She suddenly pulled out ten Molotov cocktails from her jacket, lit them, and plunged the explosives into the poxules' slimy bodies. She put in one for all seven poxules surrounding her all in two seconds. How could she move so fast? Then before I could even recover from my shock, her sword went swinging through all of their bodies, breaking the glass in the cocktail bottles and lit the poxules on Greek fire. More lighter fluid hit the fire and the poxules blazed brighter.

"Oh. My. Gods. Cres!" I ran over to her and slashed the rest of the skeletons in half. "How in the fresh hell did you do that?"

"I don't know," she said, looking dazed. "Instict?"

Machine gun hammering stopped as Roxy pulled her finger off the trigger. "All the skellies and poxxies here are regenerating now," she confirmed. "They don't regenerate fast, but I say we get a move on."

After helping Shoots collect his arrows, we all jogged out to the van and jumped in. "Anyone have injuries?" James asked.

Everyone had suffered minor grazes that could all be treated with Band-Aids, so we drove back onto the highway, quickly. We were all panting and exhausted, wondering why we had to kill so many monsters on only our road trip's first stop. Where had they come from? Why did they need Cres's blood? How'd they find us, anyway?

An hour later and we were welcomed into Pennsylvania.

"The City of Brotherly Love," Shoots sing-songed, long since recovered from the Battle of Pizza Hut, as were now calling it.

"_I_ hope," Vicks said.

* * *

**A/N: REVIEW! I swear it only takes five seconds. Next update will hopefully be soon. More reviews and I feel more motivated. Happy Chinese New Year to everyone who celebrates it!!! OH AND PERCY JACKSON AND THE LIGHTNING THIEF MOVIE comes out in theaters where I'm at IN FOUR DAYS!!!!!!!! REVEL in the BRUNETTE ANNABETH, the SIXTEEN YEAR OLD PERCY, and the DUMBLEDORE-LOOKING CHIRON!!!!!!!**


	9. Bath Party

**A/N: I haven't updated in six months . . . I feel really really guilty. **

Arrow of the Fallen - Chapter Nine: Bath Party

* * *

"What's this?"

"What's what?"

Shoots held up a flyer that was stuck on our windshield. Someone must have put it there while we were shopping for groceries at Wal-Mart.

"'_Join us in our fifth annual Bath Party!_

'_Bring your swimsuits and bathrobes!_

'_Towels and refreshments will be provided!_

'_Thirteen to nineteen year olds only!'"_ Shoots read out loud.

"What exactly is a bath party?" Cres asked.

"It seems like it's a pool party – but with _bathtubs._"

"Sounds dangerous," James decided. "We are not going."

Everyone looked at him.

"What?" he snapped.

"We're going. The address is along the way, anyway. But the Ninn rule applies, and it really applies this time," I said, putting the Cheez-its we bought into the trunk.

"The Ninn rule?" Cres said, confused.

"It's when you act like a ninny," I explained. Roxy rolled her eyes.

"Really?"

"Oh my gods, the word 'gullible' is written in the sky!"

Dear Cres punched me for the umpteenth time, and it was on the bruise formed from the last time she punched me. Freakin' painful.

"The Ninn rule stands for Normal Is Not Normal, or N.I.N.N., but we just call it Ninn, which sort of sounds like 'ninny'," Roxy explained, looking at me like I was a retard.

"The point is that half-bloods have to pay extra attention whenever they enter any public area. Monsters are evolving and getting smarter, and when they do, they learn new techniques to trick us. Before, we got suspicious when all around us were beautiful people. Nowhere in this world has all beautiful people. And then we can assume that a monster is involved. But then monsters tried to make a place look 'normal', with a healthy mix of all types of people. Girls, guys, pretty, ugly, tall, short, fat, skinny, and even multi racial people. Then again, Nowhere in this world has a perfect mix of people! So 'normal' is not _normal,_and that's what the Ninn rule is about," James rambled.

"Basically, be on guard," Van said, shortening it up nicely.

"I think Cres gets it," Vickie said pointedly. "If we stand here any longer, we're gonna be late for the party."

We were there in ten minutes. The sky was turning pink and growing darker as the sun disappeared below the horizon. The first day of our road trip was nearly over and we didn't really achieve anything yet except for almost getting killed in a Pizza Hut.

The address on the flyer led us to a farm off of Lancaster with a giant white mansion at the middle. It looked like the White House, but somehow it was classier and had gold and purple paint embellishments. There was a huge verandah and two girls wearing bathrobes were standing at the top of the steps.

"Hey, you guys, what's up?" called the taller, younger looking girl. I'd say she looked fourteen or fifteen. She was naturally pretty but she had applied too much makeup and that ruined her.

"Hey," Van said, flirtation mode turned on. Or something. "We came for a bath party?"

"Yup, it's over by the backyard! I'm Bindy, by the way, and this is my older sister, Haley."

So they were sisters. You could tell by the strong jawline, cheekbones, and noses, but other than that, they were completely different.

"Uh, Bindy, is it okay if we used the bathroom? We've been on the road all day and didn't have a chance to change into our swimsuits," said Cres, hefting a rather large tote full of clothes and other girl things like that. "The guys changed in the van, freakin' scarring my eyes forever," she added in an undertone.

The girls had the option of getting out while we changed, but guess what? They didn't! Which meant they stayed just to peek at us.

"Of course!" Bindy chirped. "Just follow me, and Haley will lead the guys to the backyard."

It's not like we'll get lost trying to find the backyard ourselves, right? But whatever, Haley was pretty cute and it would be cool getting to know her better.

Roxy glared at me as if she knew what I was thinking. She looked at me, eyed Cres, put two thumbs up, and flashed a huge smile.

Dude. Really?

Lay off with the matchmaking!

Meanwhile, Haley had guided us around the verandah out to a ginormous yard filled with lots and lots of bathtubs.

"Where'd you get all these bathtubs anyway?" asked James. "There's tons."

"We're sponsored by Lancaster's local bathtub and bathroom company because they like how we're sort of advertising them," said Haley. Her voice was quiet compared to her sister's but somehow it had this powerful undertone.

They had so many bathtubs of all sorts and sizes that the whole town could probably fit in them, and it seemed like the whole town _was_there! There were so many teenagers sitting in the tubs; it was pretty surreal. In one of the larger bathtubs, someone had set up a disco ball and strobe lights and there was a mini underwater dance party. In another section, mood lighting cast the area with a romantic glow and some jazz singer was on the stereo. Couples were making out and I could tell that Van was interested. Disgusting pig. Each tub had a stand loaded with canned drinks, pitchers of water and punch, and universal party snack foods like pretzels and chips. The whole thing seemed like a combination of the coolest club in NYC and a plain old pool party.

Van, Shoots, and James left for a huge bathtub that could fit twenty people and then I was alone with Haley.

"Do you want to get into a tub?" Haley offered. "My shift at the main entrance is over."

"Yeah, sure."

She took off her bathrobe to reveal a curvy body clad in a cute black polka dotted bikini. I wondered how old she was.

"So, what brings you guys to Lancaster?" Haley said, sliding into the nearest small bathtub.

"We're doing a road trip from New York City to Las Vegas."

Man, the water was refreshing.

She raised her eyebrows. "Long trip! And how old are you guys? Fifteen, sixteen?"

"We're all fifteen except for Shoots, the tall blonde guy with all the piercings. He's sixteen, so he drives. But Roxy and James drive sometimes, but keep that a secret?"

Smiling, she took a drink from the refreshments stand next to our tub and sipped it. "Of course. What did you say your name was?"

"Oh, I'm Nico."

"Well, Nico, since you told me a secret, I should tell you some of mine," Haley said, still smiling.

Hmm, okay.

"I've lived in Lancaster for about a year."

I raised an eyebrow. "That's your secret? Somehow, I was expecting something more _secretive, _if you know what I mean," I smirked.

"I wasn't even done talking before you rudely interrupted me," Haley said flatly.

"Okay, carry on, carry on," I said, still grinning.

"And would you stop smiling! It's a depressing horror story, and it's really hard to tell when you're _laughing _at me like that!"

"I'm not laughing at you!" I protested, but dropped the smile.

Haley sighed, and continued again. "So, my secret. It's hard keeping it bottled up and ever since I moved here, I've wanted to tell somebody, but I couldn't tell any of my new close friends that I met in Lancaster," she paused, closing her eyes slowly.

"That bad?" I asked skeptically. I hardly doubted that any mortal girl out here could have a secret that horrible. Compared to the life half-bloods have to live, mortals' problems are so trivial and hardly ever life threatening.

"Like you wouldn't believe," she said. "I _want_ to get it off my chest but the only person I can tell it to is someone who is a total stranger. Then I'd never have to see that random stranger again. Someone who couldn't look at me later on and go like, 'that's the crazy girl.' I didn't want anyone to give me a face of disgust or pity, or something worse. A total stranger I would never have to see again, and who would never have the chance to look down on me. Or even fear me."

She glanced at me. "It seems like you're the right person, Nico. So," she took a breath, "Can you handle it?"

That kind of hurt, because it would be cool knowing Haley later when we were in the same retirement home or something. I guess then I could be like, "Oh hey, aren't you the girl who told me her secrets sixty years ago?" And she'd answer, "That's right, we were sitting in a bath tub!"

"Yeah, I think I can," I replied, and she smiled for a split second before starting her story.

"I used to live in Chicago a year ago," she said. "One day, I saw my boyfriend's ex-girlfriend being mobbed by these really buff guys – and one of them was holding a gun. They were harassing her for her money, and worse shit like that. I barely knew her but I wanted to help her. Plus I was really pissed off with what the guys were doing to her. So I kinda punched the guy with the gun, caught him off guard, and grabbed his weapon."

She was staring off into the distance, electric green eyes glittering. I could tell she was still tense about this whole experience, but she was telling the story calmly in her quiet, measured voice.

"Racing with adrenaline, I shot all the guys somehow. But then I realized what I had done and I went kind of crazy with grief – so I shot the main guy – until all the bullets ran out – and – he was dead before I knew it.

"So my secret is that I killed someone."

Whoa.

The way she said it; it was like she was the best storyteller in the world.

I didn't really believe her. How could she actually have killed someone? Did she even ever live in Chicago? If it was all a giant story, _damn_ she was good at keeping a poker face. Haley continued, and somehow, with the next words, I knew she was telling the truth.

"That girl I saved, my boyfriend's old ex, her name was Katrina."

Oh, shit.

"She was really gorgeous, and she told me later when we were both sent to see the shrink that she got mobbed all the time. She told me she'd lost loads of money and a lot of her innocence too."

Haley closed her eyes and downed her drink.

"Haley?"

"Yeah?"

"Was her name, by any chance, was her name Katrina Fallen?"

Haley's beautiful green eyes widened. "How did you know? Do you know her?"

"We're kind of looking for her," I confessed, skipping the fact that Katrina was Cres's aunt since that would be majorly confusing for a mortal like Haley, "but wasn't she supposed to be in Vegas?"

"She did mention that she was from Vegas, originally," said Haley suspiciously. "And after the whole Chicago incident she told me she was moving back to either Vegas or Los Angeles with her brother. Bindy and I were shipped off to our grandparents here in Lancaster. But why would you want to find Katrina? Why would you do a road trip to do it?"

Time for some spontaneous lies!

"Shoots' older brother died in a plane crash over the Pacific Ocean. He's deathly afraid of planes and flying. And Katrina is Cres's long lost cousin and she's been trying to find her for ages. After a Google search, we found something like an address in Vegas under the name of Katrina Fallen," I explained quickly, and was rewarded by an understanding look in Haley's eyes.

"Is Cres that girl with the auburn, reddish brownish hair?"

I nodded.

Haley relaxed. "I noticed when you first arrived here that she looked extremely similar to Kat. I just thought she was a lookalike, but apparently they're related! But what are the chances that we would somehow meet together in a bath party in Lancaster?"

"It's a small world," I said cryptically, making her smile. Which made me feel good.

"Can you make a promise to me though? When you find Katrina, can you promise to protect her no matter what happens? She gets into trouble a lot, and I don't like the way she said she was mobbed practically every other day."

"Alright, sure." It was the least I could do to help Haley. She was a really great girl and I felt like I owed her a favor.

"Okay, what's the most serious swear you know? I only know the 'cross your heart' one."

"Well, there's this Greek one I know," I said with a smile. "I swear by the River Styx that I will protect Katrina Fallen no matter what happens."

She ducked her head fast like she was embarrassed. "That's great, Nico. I feel a lot better."

* * *

It only occurred to me when we were miles away from the bath party that I had swore an oath.

_An oath to keep with final breath._

"Shit."

"What is it, Nico?" asked Roxy, wet and shining from the party. I think she met a guy who was 'super freakin' cool and hot'.

"I swore an oath. At the party. An oath of the River Styx kind."

Silence in the van.

Not even Van could think of anything to say.

Finally James spoke up. "I should never have gone off and left you alone!"

"I think I'm going to be sick," I moaned, banging my head against a window.

I was such an idiot.

* * *

**A/N: So anyone read Rick Riordan's newest book, the Red Pyramid? Because Anubis is the hottest guy Rick has _ever _created. Just sayin'. Thanks to my friend's cousin for coming up with the term "bath party", and my other friend for editing this chapter - 'cuz I messed up, a lot. REVIEW PLEASE :) **


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